Editing Sumerian language (section)

==Classification==
Sumerian is a [[language isolate]].<ref name="Piotr Michalowski 2004, Pages 19-59"/><ref>{{cite book|author=Georges Roŭ|title=Ancient Iraq|edition=3rd |publisher=Penguin Books|location=London|year=1993|pages=80–82}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=[[Joan Oates]]|title=Babylon|edition=Rev.|publisher=Thames and Hudson|location=London|year=1986|page=19}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=John Haywood|title=The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Civilizations|publisher=Penguin Books|location=London|year=2005|page=28}}</ref> At one time{{When|date=March 2025}} it was widely held to be an [[Indo-European languages|Indo-European language]], but that view has been almost universally rejected.<ref>{{cite book |author=Dewart, Leslie |title=Evolution and Consciousness: The Role of Speech in the Origin and Development of Human Nature |year=1989 |page=260}}</ref> Since [[Decipherment of cuneiform|decipherment]] began in the early 20th century, scholars have tried to relate Sumerian to a wide variety of languages. Because of its prestige as the first attested written language, proposals for linguistic affinity often have a [[nationalistic]] flavour.<ref name="michal04" /> Attempts have been made without success to link Sumerian with a range of widely disparate groups such as [[Indo-European languages|Indo-European]], [[Austroasiatic languages|Austroasiatic]],<ref>{{cite journal |author=DIAKONOFF, Igor M. |year=1997 |title=External Connections of the Sumerian Language |journal=Mother Tongue |volume=3 |pages=54–63}}</ref> [[Dravidian languages|Dravidian]],<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sathasivam |first1=A |title=Proto-Sumero-Dravidian: The Common Origin of Sumerian and Dravidian Languages |date=2017 |publisher=History and Heritage Unit, Tamil Information Centre |isbn=978-1-85201-024-9 |location=Kingston, UK}}</ref> [[Uralic languages|Uralic]],<ref>Papakitsos, Evangelos; Kananidis, Ioannis|year=2013|title=Yet Another Suggestion about the Origins of the Sumerian Language |journal=International Journal of Linguistics, V.5, n.55 (2013)</ref>).<ref name="Parpola 2007">Parpola, S., "Sumerian: A Uralic Language (I)", Proceedings of the 53th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale: Vol. 1: Language in the Ancient Near East (2 parts), edited by Leonid E. Kogan, Natalia Koslova, Sergey Loesov and Serguei Tishchenko, University Park, USA: Penn State University Press, pp. 181-210, 2010</ref><ref>Gostony, C. G. 1975: Dictionnaire d'étymologie sumérienne et grammaire comparée. Paris.</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Zakar |first=András |year=1971 |title=Sumerian&nbsp;– Ural-Altaic affinities |journal=Current Anthropology |volume=12 |issue=2 |pages=215–225 |doi=10.1086/201193 |jstor=2740574 |s2cid=143879460}}.</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Bobula, Ida |title=Sumerian affiliations. A Plea for Reconsideration |year=1951 |location=Washington D.C.}} (Mimeographed ms.)</ref> [[Sino-Tibetan languages|Sino-Tibetan]],<ref name="Braun">{{cite journal |author=Jan Braun |year=2004 |title=SUMERIAN AND TIBETO-BURMAN, Additional Studies |journal=Wydawnictwo Agade |location=Warszawa |isbn=83-87111-32-5}}.</ref> and [[Turkic languages|Turkic]] (the last being promoted by [[Turkey|Turkish]] nationalists as part of the [[Sun language theory]]<ref>{{Cite news|date=2 March 1936|title=Urges Turks to teach culture of their race, Kemal says historians have maligned people, Sun Language revived|page=24|work=[[The News Journal]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|year=2017|title=Sumerian Turks: Civilization's Journey from Siberia to Mesopotamia|isbn=9781521532362|first=Mehmet|last=Kurtkaya|publisher=Independently Published }}</ref>). Additionally, long-range proposals have attempted to include Sumerian in broad [[Macrofamily|macrofamilies]], often including other notable isolates like [[Basque language|Basque]] or small families like [[Koreanic languages|Koreanic]].<ref>{{cite book |author-last1=Bomhard |author-first1=Allan R. |title=Toward Proto-Nostratic: a new approach to the comparison of Proto-Indo-European and Proto-Afroasiatic |author-last2=Hopper |author-first2=Paul J. |publisher=John Benjamins |year=1984 |isbn=9789027235190 |location=Amsterdam |chapter=Current Issues in Linguistic Theory |issue=27}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author-last=Ruhlen |author-first=Merritt |title=The Origin of Language: Tracing the Evolution of the Mother Tongue |publisher=John Wiley & Sons, Inc |year=1994 |location=New York |page=143}}</ref> Such proposals enjoy virtually no support among modern linguists, Sumerologists, or Assyriologists, and are typically seen as [[Fringe theory|fringe theories]] due to their unverifiability.<ref name="michal04" />

It has also been suggested that the Sumerian language descended from a late [[prehistoric]] [[creole language]].<ref>{{cite journal|author=Høyrup, Jens|year=1998|title=Sumerian: The descendant of a proto-historical creole? An alternative approach to the Sumerian problem|journal=Published: AIΩN. Annali del Dipartimento di Studi del Mondo Classico e del Mediterraneo Antico. Sezione linguistica|location=Istituto Universitario Orientale, Napoli|issue=1992; publ. 1994|volume=14|pages=21–72, Figs. 1–3}} Available in: http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED368171.pdf</ref> However, no conclusive evidence beyond a handful of typological features can be found to support this view. A more widespread hypothesis posits a [[Proto-Euphratean language]] family that preceded Sumerian in Mesopotamia and exerted an [[Areal feature|areal]] influence on it, especially in the form of polysyllabic words that appear "un-Sumerian"—making them suspect of being [[loanword]]s—and are not traceable to any other known language family. There is little speculation as to the affinities of this hypothetical [[Stratum (linguistics)|substratum]] language, or these languages, and it is thus best treated as [[Unclassified language|unclassified]].<ref>Monaco, Salvatore F., "Proto-Cuneiform And Sumerians", Rivista Degli Studi Orientali, vol. 87, no. 1/4, pp. 277–82, 2014</ref> Other researchers disagree with the assumption of a single substratum language and argue that several languages are involved.<ref>{{cite journal|author=Rubio, Gonzalo|title=On the alleged 'pre-Sumerian substratum'|journal=Journal of Cuneiform Studies|year=1999|volume=51|issue=1999|pages=1–16|doi=10.2307/1359726|jstor=1359726|s2cid=163985956}}</ref> A related proposal by Gordon Whittaker<ref>{{cite journal|last=Whittaker|first=Gordon|date=2008|title=The Case for Euphratic|journal=Bulletin of the Georgian National Academy of Sciences|location=Tbilisi|volume=2|issue=3|pages=156–168|url=http://science.org.ge/old/moambe/2-3/Gordon%20Whitteker.pdf|access-date=11 December 2012|archive-date=9 October 2022|archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20221009/http://science.org.ge/old/moambe/2-3/Gordon%20Whitteker.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref> is that the language of the proto-literary texts from the Late Uruk period ({{circa|lk=no}} 3350–3100 BC) is really an early extinct branch of Indo-European language which he terms "Euphratic" which somehow emerged long prior to the accepted timeline for the spread of Indo-European into West Asia, though this is rejected by mainstream opinion which accepts Sumerian as a [[language isolate]].