Editing Geʽez (section)

=== Origins ===
[[File:Aksum, iscrizione di re ezana, in greco, sabeo e ge'ez, 330-350 dc ca. 10.jpg|thumb|The [[Ezana Stone]], engraved from AD 330 to 356, is written in ancient Geʽez, [[Sabaean language|Sabaean]] and [[Greek language|Greek]].]]

The Geʽez language is classified as a [[South Semitic language]], though an alternative hypothesis posits that the Semitic languages of Eritrea and Ethiopia may best be considered an independent branch of Semitic,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=M. |first=E. |date=1935 |title=Note on the Languages of Abyssinia |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25639482 |journal=Bulletin of International News |volume=12 |issue=12 |pages=3–5 |jstor=25639482 |issn=2044-3986}}</ref> with Geʽez and the closely related [[Tigrinya language|Tigrinya]] and [[Tigre language|Tigre]] languages forming a northern branch while [[Amharic language|Amharic]], Argobba, Harari and the Gurage languages form the southern branch.{{sfn|Gragg|2008|p=428}}

Inscriptions dating to the mid-1st millennium BCE, written in the [[Sabaean language]] in the [[South Arabian alphabet|epigraphic South Arabian script]], have been found in the kingdom of [[Dʿmt]], serving at least as a witness to a presence of speakers of Semitic languages in the region. There is some evidence of Semitic languages being spoken in [[Eritrea]] since approximately 2000 BC.{{sfn|Stuart|1991|p=57}} Unlike previously assumed, the Geʽez language is now not regarded as an offshoot of [[Sabaean language|Sabaean]] or any other forms of [[Old South Arabian]].<ref>Weninger, Stefan, "Geʽez" in ''Encyclopaedia Aethiopica: D-Ha'', p.732.</ref>{{sfn|Gragg|2008|p=428}}

Early inscriptions in Geʽez from the [[Kingdom of Aksum]] (appearing varyingly in the epigraphic South Arabian script, and unvocalized or vocalized Ethiopic/Geʽez script{{sfn|Gragg|2008|p=430}}) have been dated to as early as the 4th century CE. The surviving Geʽez literature properly begins in the same century with the Christianization of the Aksum, during the reign of [[Ezana of Axum|Ezana of Aksum]].<ref name="internationalstandardbible.com"/>{{sfn|Gragg|2008|p=430}} The oldest known example of the Geʽez script, unvocalized and containing religiously [[Paganism|pagan]] references, is found on the [[Hawulti (monument)|Hawulti]] obelisk in [[Matara, Eritrea]].<ref>Edward Ullendorff, [https://www.jstor.org/stable/25222457 "The Obelisk of Matara", ''Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland''], No. 1/2 (April, 1951), pp. 26–32</ref> There exist about a dozen long inscriptions dating to the 4th and 5th centuries, and over 200 short ones.{{sfn|Gragg|2008|p=430}}