{{Infobox Language family
|name=Afro-Asiatic
|region=[[Horn of Africa]], [[North Africa]], northern [[Central Africa]], northern [[West Africa]], [[Southwest Asia]]
|familycolor=Afro-Asiatic
|family=One of the World's major [[language family|language families]]
|child1=[[Berber languages|Berber]]
|child2=[[Chadic languages|Chadic]]
|child3=[[Egyptian language|Egyptian]]
|child4=[[Semitic languages|Semitic]]
|child5=[[Cushitic languages|Cushitic]]
|child6=[[Omotic languages|Omotic]]
|iso2=afa
|map=[[Image:Afro-Asiatic.png|center|300px]]<center>Distribution of Afro-Asiatic shown in yellow</center>
}}
The '''Afro-Asiatic languages''' constitute a [[language family]] with about 375 languages ([[SIL_International|SIL]] estimate) and more than 300 million speakers spread throughout [[North Africa]], [[East Africa]], [[West Africa]], [[Central Africa]], and [[Southwest Asia]] (including some 200 million speakers of [[Arabic language|Arabic]]). Other names sometimes given to this family include "Afrasian", "Hamito-Semitic", "Lisramic" (Hodge 1972), "Erythraean" (Tucker 1966).

The family includes the following language subfamilies:

* [[Berber languages]]
* [[Chadic languages]]
* [[Egyptian language]]
* [[Semitic languages]]
* [[Cushitic languages]]
* [[Omotic languages]] (sometimes classified as part of Cushitic)

* [[Beja language]] (subclassification controversial; widely classified as part of Cushitic)

Many people regard the [[Ongota language|Ongota]] language as Omotic, but its classification within the family remains controversial, partly for lack of data. [[Harold C. Fleming|Harold Fleming]] tentatively suggests treating it as an independent branch of non-Omotic Afro-Asiatic.[http://www.jstor.org/view/00113204/dm991524/99p0046v/0]

== Original homeland (''Urheimat'')==

No agreement exists on where [[Proto-Afro-Asiatic]] speakers lived (i.e. the Afro-Asiatic ''[[Urheimat]]''), though the language is generally believed to have originated in Northeast Africa[http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/citation/306/5702/1680c][http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0011-3204%28199802%2939%3A1%3C139%3ATALPAI%3E2.0.CO%3B2-J&size=LARGE]. Some scholars (such as [[Igor Diakonoff]] and [[Lionel Bender]]) have proposed [[Ethiopia]], because it includes the majority of the diversity of the Afro-Asiatic language family and has very diverse groups in close geographic proximity, often considered a telltale sign for a linguistic geographic origin. Other researchers (such as [[Christopher Ehret]]) have put forward the western [[Red Sea]] coast and the [[Sahara]]. A minority (such as Alexander Militarev) suggest a linguistic homeland in the [[Levant]] (specifically, he identifies Afro-Asiatic with the [[Natufian culture]]), with Semitic being the only branch to stay put.[http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/306/5702/1680c]

The [[Semitic language]]s form the only Afro-Asiatic subfamily extant outside of Africa. Some scholars believe that, in historical or near-historical times, Semitic speakers crossed from South Arabia back into Ethiopia and Eritrea, while others, such as A. Murtonen, dispute this view, suggesting that the Semitic branch may have originated in Ethiopia<ref>Fleming, Harold C. (1968), "Ethiopic Language History: Testing Linguistic Hypotheses in an Archaeological and Documentary Context" in ''Ethnohistory'', Vol. 15, No. 4 (Autumn), pp. 353-388</ref>. A third view, based upon similarities between Semitic and ancient Egyptian, is that the two languages developed from a common ancestral tongue along the Nile, crossing the Sinai with the dry phase from 6,000-5,800 BCE, at the end of the pre-pottery neolithic ([[PPNB]]) phase in the Levant <ref>Midant-Reynes, Beatrix (2000), ''The Prehistory of Egypt: from the first Egyptians to the first Pharaohs'' (Blackwell) pp.73-75</ref>. Hunter-gatherers of the el-Harif mesolithic culture, crossing the Sinai and from Northern Egypt, and adopting animal domestication but not agriculture could then have created what Juris Yarins calls the Syro-Arabian [[nomadic pastoralism]] complex, spreading south along the shore of the Red Sea, and north eastwards around the edge of the "[[fertile crescent]]". In the Levant this development appears as the Minhata, and later Yarmoukian culture, which came from the same semi-arid zone as did the later Ghassulian and Semitic Amorites cultures<ref>Perrot J. (1964), "Les deux premieres campagnesde feuilles a Munhata" ''Syria'' XLI pp323-45</ref><ref>Mellaart, James (1975), ''The Neolithic of the Near East'' (London: Thames and Hudson), pp. 239-241</ref>.

[[Tonal language]]s appear in the Omotic, Chadic, and South and East Cushitic branches of Afro-Asiatic, according to Ehret (1996). The Semitic, Berber, and Egyptian branches do not use tones [[phoneme|phonemically]]. Given the diversity that exists within the Afro-Asiatic group, and the lack of common vocabulary for agricultural items, it is suggested that the languages dispersed before the commencement of the Neolithic. The finding of a common vocabulary for pottery containers, however, suggests that this technology was known.

For example Proto-Semitic ''*k'ad-ah-'' "vessel", found in Arabic ''kadah'' "drinking bowl, cup, goblet, glass, tumbler"; Sabaean ''m-kdh(m,n)'' "cup; Ethiopic / Geez ''kadho'' "vessel, gourd", ''ma-kdeht'' "jar, jug, bucket"; Lowland East Cushitic ''*k'adad-'' "vessel, gourd''; Oromo ''k'odaa'' "vessel, gourd''; Egyptian ''qd'' "pot"; Lowland East Kushitic ''*k'od-'' "receptical"; Oromo ''k'odaa'' "receptacle"; West Chadic ''*k'wad-'' "calabash"; Dangla ''koda'' "pot" gives Proto-Afro-Asiatic ''*k'ud-/*k'od-'' "Vessel, pot"<ref>Bomhard, Alan R (1996), "Indo-European and the Nostratic Hypothesis" (Signum)</ref>.

Ehret <ref>Ehret, Christopher (1982), "On the antiquity of agriculture in Ethiopia" ''Journal of African History'' (Uni of Calif. Berkeley Press)</ref> suggests that early Afro-Asiatic languages were involved in the domestication of Ethiopian food crops, but this is disputed by others who suggest these words were found only in the [[Cushitic]] and possibly [[Omotic]] families, and common cognates for agriculture are not present. Given that wavy line pottery is found widely in the Sahara from 8,000 BCE<ref>Barnett, William & Hoopes, John (Eds.) (1995). ''The Emergence of Pottery''. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press. ISBN 1-56098-517-8</ref>, and that the neolithic agriculture technologies arrived 5000 BCE<ref>Midant-Reynes, Beatrix (2000), ''The Prehistory of Egypt: from the first Egyptians to the first Pharaohs'' (Blackwell)</ref>, this sets a possible context for Proto-Afro-Asiatic dispersal. As it is known that the Ethiopian farmers moved into the highlands from the direction of Nubian Sudan, and attempts to translate the [[Meroitic script]] found in this area show significant Afro-Asiatic characteristics, linguist Lionel Bender suggests that it was out of this area of the Southern Nile that was the centre for dispersion of the Afro-Asiatic languages occurred<ref>Bender, Lionel (1997), "Upside Down Afrasian"''Africanistiche Arbeitspapiers'' 50, pp19-34</ref>. The dates of pottery and agriculture set approximate early and late dates for this linguistic dispersal. Climatically this was a period of a "wet Sahara" phase with large rivers and lakes. The dispersal of Afro-Asiatic may thus have been a response to the recent operation of the "[[Sahara pump theory|Sahara pump]]"<ref>Fagan, Brian (2004), ''The Long Hot Summer: how climate changed civilisation'' (London: Grant Books)</ref><ref>Burroughs, William J. (2005), ''Climate Change in Prehistory:the end of the reign of Chaos'' (Cambridge University Press)</ref>.

==Common features and cognates==
Common features of the Afro-Asiatic languages include:
* a two-[[grammatical gender|gender]] system in the singular, with the feminine marked by the /t/ sound,
* [[Verb Subject Object|VSO]] [[linguistic typology|typology]] with [[Subject Verb Object|SVO]] tendencies,
* a set of [[emphatic consonant]]s, variously realized as glottalized, pharyngealized, or implosive, and
* a templatic [[morphology (linguistics)|morphology]] in which words inflect by internal changes as well as with prefixes and suffixes.

Some cognates include:
*''b-n-'' "build" (Ehret: *''bĭn''), attested in Chadic, Semitic (''*bny''), Cushitic (*''mĭn''/*''măn'' "house"), Berber (*''bn'') and Omotic (Dime ''bin-'' "build, create");
*''m-t'' "die" (Ehret: *''maaw''), attested in Chadic (for example, Hausa ''mutu''), Egyptian (''mwt'' ''*muwt'', ''mt'', Coptic ''mu''), Berber (''mmet'', pr. ''yemmut''), Semitic (*''mwt''), and Cushitic (Proto-Somali *''umaaw''/*''-am-w(t)-'' "die"). (Also similar to the [[Proto-Indo-European language|PIE]] base ''*mor-/mr-''. "die", evidence in favor of both the Afro-Asiatic and Indo-European language families' classification in the hypothetical [[Nostratic]] superfamily.)
*''s-n'' "know", attested in Chadic, Berber, and Egyptian;
*''l-s'' "tongue" (Ehret: ''*lis' '' "to lick"), attested in Semitic (*''lasaan/lisaan''), Egyptian (''ns'' *''ls'', Coptic ''las''), Berber (''ils''), Chadic (for example, Hausa ''harshe''), and possibly Omotic (Dime ''lits'-'' "lick");
*''s-m'' "name" (Ehret: *''sŭm'' / *''sĭm''), attested in Semitic (*''sm''), Berber (''ism''), Chadic (for example, Hausa ''suna''), Cushitic, and Omotic (though some see the Berber form, ''ism'', and the Omotic form, ''sunts'', as Semitic [[loanword]]s.) The Egyptian ''smi'' "report, announce" offers another possible cognate.
* ''d-m'' "blood" (Ehret: *''dîm'' / *''dâm''), attested in Berber (''idammen''), Semitic (*''dam''), Chadic, and arguably Omotic. Compare Cushitic *''dîm''/*''dâm'', "red".

In the verbal system, Semitic, Berber, and Cushitic (including Beja) all provide evidence for a prefix conjugation:
{|
|-
| English || Arabic (Semitic) || [[Kabyle language|Kabyle]] (Berber)
| [[Somali]] (Cushitic) || Beja (verb is "arrive")
|-
| he dies || ''yamuutu'' || ''yemmut''
| ''wudimta'' || ''iktim''
|-
| she dies || ''tamuutu'' || ''temmut''
| ''wedimata'' || ''tiktim''
|-
| they (m.) die || ''yamuutuuna'' || ''mmuten''
| ''wedimtan'' || ''iktimna''
|-
| you (m. sg.) die || ''tamuutu'' || ''temmuteḍ''
| ''wadimate'' || ''tiktima''
|-
| you (m. pl.) die || ''tamuutuuna'' || ''temmutem''
| ''wadimatan'' || ''tiktimna''
|-
| I die || ''ˀamuutu'' || ''mmuteɣ''
| ''wadimta'' || ''aktim''
|-
| we die || ''namuutu'' || ''nemmut'' || ''wadimane'' || ''niktim''
|}

All Afro-Asiatic subfamilies show evidence of a causative affix ''s'', but a similar suffix also appears in other groups, such as the [[Niger-Congo languages]].

Semitic, Berber, Cushitic (including Beja), and Chadic support [[possessive suffix]]es.

==Classification history==<!-- This section is linked from [[Berber people]] -->
Medieval scholars sometimes linked two or more branches of Afro-Asiatic together; as early as the [[9th century]] the Hebrew grammarian [[Judah ibn Quraysh]] of [[Tiaret]] in [[Algeria]] perceived a relationship between Berber and Semitic (the latter group known to him through Arabic, Hebrew, and Aramaic).

In the course of the 19th century Europeans also began suggesting such relationships; thus in [[1844]] [[Theodor Benfey|Th. Benfey]] suggested a language family containing Semitic, Berber, and Cushitic (calling the latter "Ethiopic"). In the same year, T. N. Newman suggested a relationship between Semitic and Hausa, but this would long remain a topic of dispute and uncertainty. [[Friedrich Müller (linguist)|Friedrich Müller]] named the traditional "Hamito-Semitic" family in [[1876]] in his ''Grundriss der Sprachwissenschaft'', and defined it as consisting of a Semitic group plus a "Hamitic" group containing Egyptian, Berber, and Cushitic; he excluded the Chadic group. These classifications relied in part on non-linguistic anthropological and racial arguments. (See also [[Hamitic hypothesis]].)

[[Leo Reinisch]] (1909) proposed to link Cushitic and Chadic, while urging a more distant affinity with Egyptian and Semitic, thus foreshadowing Greenberg; but his suggestion found little resonance. [[Marcel Cohen]] (1924) rejected the idea of a distinct "Hamitic" subgroup, and included Hausa (a Chadic language) in his comparative Hamito-Semitic vocabulary. [[Joseph Greenberg]] (1950) strongly confirmed Cohen's rejection of "Hamitic", added (and sub-classified) the Chadic languages, and proposed the new name Afro-Asiatic for the family; almost all scholars have accepted his classification. In 1969 [[Harold Fleming (scholar)|Harold Fleming]] proposed the recognition of [[Omotic]] as a fifth branch, rather than (as previously believed) a subgroup of Cushitic, and this has met with general acceptance. Several scholars, including Harold Fleming and [[Robert Hetzron]], have since questioned the traditional inclusion of Beja in Cushitic, but this view has yet to gain general acceptance.

Little agreement exists on the sub-classification of the five or six branches mentioned; however, [[Christopher Ehret]] (1979), [[Harold Fleming (scholar)|Harold Fleming]] (1981), and [[Joseph Greenberg]] (1981) all agree that the Omotic branch split from the rest first. Otherwise:
*Ehret groups Egyptian, Berber, and Semitic together in a North Afro-Asiatic subgroup;
*[[Paul Newman (professor)|Paul Newman]] (1980) groups Berber with Chadic and Egyptian with Semitic, while questioning the inclusion of Omotic;
*Fleming (1981) divided non-Omotic Afroasiatic, or "Erythraean", into three groups, Cushitic, Semitic, and Chadic-Berber-Egyptian; he later added Semitic and Beja to the latter, and proposed [[Ongota language|Ongotá]] as a tentative new third branch of Erythraean;
*[[Lionel Bender]] (1997) advocates a "Macro-Cushitic" consisting of Berber, Cushitic, and Semitic, while regarding Chadic and Omotic as the most remote branches;
*[[Vladimir Orel]] and [[Olga Stolbova]] (1995) group Berber with Semitic, group Chadic with Egyptian, and split Cushitic into five or more independent branches of Afro-Asiatic, seeing Cushitic as a [[Sprachbund]] rather than a valid family;
*[[Alexander Militarev]] (2000), on the basis of [[lexicostatistics]], groups Berber with Chadic and both, more distantly, with Semitic, as against Cushitic and Omotic.

==See also==
* [[African languages]]

==Etymological bibliography==
Some of the main sources for Afro-Asiatic etymologies include:
* Marcel Cohen, ''Essai comparatif sur la vocabulaire et la phonétique du chamito-sémitique'', Champion, Paris 1947.
* Igor M. Diakonoff et al., "Historical-Comparative Vocabulary of Afrasian", ''St. Petersburg Journal of African Studies'' Nos. 2-6, 1993-7.
* Christopher Ehret. ''Reconstructing Proto-Afroasiatic (Proto-Afrasian): Vowels, Tone, Consonants, and Vocabulary'' (''University of California Publications in Linguistics 126''), California, Berkeley 1996.
* Vladimir E. Orel and Olga V. Stolbova, ''Hamito-Semitic [[Etymological Dictionary]]: Materials for a Reconstruction'', Brill, Leiden 1995. ISBN 90-04-10051-2. [http://www.ilx.nl/blonline/blonlinesearch2.php?ficheid=101010209591]

==References==
{{refs}}

==Sources==
* Barnett, William & Hoopes, John (Eds.) (1995). ''The Emergence of Pottery''. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press. ISBN 1-56098-517-8
* Bernd Heine and Derek Nurse, ''African Languages,'' Cambridge University Press, 2000 - Chapter 4
* Huehnergard, John (2004)“Afro-Asiatic,” in Woodard R. D. (ed.), The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World’s Ancient Languages, Cambridge-New York, 138-159
* Merritt Ruhlen, ''A Guide to the World's Languages'', Stanford University Press, Stanford 1991.
* Lionel Bender et al., ''Selected Comparative-Historical Afro-Asiatic Studies in Memory of Igor M. Diakonoff'', LINCOM 2003.
* [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=89997 Ethnologue]
* Russell G. Schuh, ''[http://www.linguistics.ucla.edu/people/schuh/Papers/Chadic_overview.pdf Chadic Overview]''.
* [http://homepage.ntlworld.com/roger_blench/Archaeology%20data/Africa%20language%20history%20text.pdf African Language History] (pdf), [[Roger Blench]]
* Carleton T. Hodge (ed.), ''Afroasiatic: a survey''. The Hague - Paris: Mouton 1971.

==External links==
*[http://www.nacal.org NACAL] The North American Conference on Afroasiatic Linguistics, now in its 35th year.
* [http://www.tufs.ac.jp/ts/personal/ratcliffe/comp%20&%20method-Ratcliffe.pdf A comparison of Orel-Stolbova's and Ehret's Afro-Asiatic reconstructions]
* [http://community.livejournal.com/terra_linguarum/95880.html Afro-Asiatic and Semitic genealogical trees], presented by [[Alexander Militarev]] at his talk “Genealogical classification of Afro-Asiatic languages according to the latest data” (at the conference on the 70th anniversary of [[V.M. Illich-Svitych]], Moscow, 2004; [http://community.livejournal.com/terra_linguarum/95627.html short annotations of the talks given there]{{ru icon}})
* [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=89997 family tree at ethnologue.com]

{{Afro-Asiatic-speaking nations}}

[[Category:Afro-Asiatic languages| ]]

[[af:Afro-Asiatiese tale]]
[[ar:لغات أفروآسيوية]]
[[an:Luengas afro-asiaticas]]
[[bn:আফ্রো-এশীয় ভাষাসমূহ]]
[[bs:Afroazijski jezici]]
[[br:Yezhoù afrez-aziatek]]
[[bg:Афро-азиатски езици]]
[[ca:Llengües afroasiàtiques]]
[[cs:Afroasijské jazyky]]
[[cy:Ieithoedd Affro-Asiaidd]]
[[da:Afroasiatiske sprog]]
[[de:Afroasiatische Sprachen]]
[[el:Αφροασιατικές γλώσσες]]
[[es:Lenguas afroasiáticas]]
[[eo:Afrikazia lingvaro]]
[[eu:Afroasiar hizkuntzak]]
[[fa:زبان‌های آفریقایی-آسیایی]]
[[fr:Langues afro-asiatiques]]
[[ga:Teangacha Afráiseacha]]
[[ko:아프리카아시아어족]]
[[hi:सामी-हामी भाषा-परिवार]]
[[hsb:Afroaziske rěče]]
[[hr:Afroazijski jezici]]
[[ilo:Pagsasao nga Afro-Asiatica]]
[[id:Bahasa Afro-Asia]]
[[ia:Linguas afro-asiatic]]
[[it:Lingue afro-asiatiche]]
[[he:שפות אפרו-אסיאתיות]]
[[kn:ಆಫ್ರೋ-ಏಷ್ಯಾಟಿಕ್ ಭಾಷೆಗಳು]]
[[ku:Zimanmalbata efrîqa û asyayî]]
[[la:Linguae Afrasiaticae]]
[[lt:Semitų-chamitų kalbos]]
[[hu:Afroázsiai nyelvcsalád]]
[[ms:Bahasa-bahasa Afro-Asia]]
[[nl:Afro-Aziatische talen]]
[[ja:アフロ・アジア語族]]
[[no:Afroasiatiske språk]]
[[nn:Afroasiatiske språk]]
[[oc:Lengas afroasiaticas]]
[[pl:Języki afroazjatyckie]]
[[pt:Línguas afro-asiáticas]]
[[ru:Афразийские языки]]
[[sk:Semitsko-hamitské jazyky]]
[[sl:Afroazijski jeziki]]
[[sr:Афро-азијски језици]]
[[fi:Afroaasialaiset kielet]]
[[sv:Afroasiatiska språk]]
[[ta:ஆபிரிக்க-ஆசிய மொழிகள்]]
[[kab:Tutlayin tifrusyawiyin]]
[[uk:Афразійські мови]]
[[zh:闪含语系]]