Editing Fertile Crescent (section)

==Languages==
{{More citations needed section|date=June 2021}}
Linguistically, the Fertile Crescent was a region of great diversity. Historically, [[Semitic languages]] generally prevailed in the modern regions of [[Iraq]], [[Syria]], [[Jordan]], [[Lebanon]], [[Israel]], [[Palestine (region)|Palestine]], [[Sinai Peninsula|Sinai]] and  the fringes of southeast [[Turkey]] and northwest [[Iran]], as well as the [[Sumerian language|Sumerian]] (a [[language isolate]]) in Iraq, whilst in the mountainous areas to the east and north a number of generally unrelated [[language isolates]] were found, including; [[Elamite language|Elamite]], [[Gutian language|Gutian]] and [[Kassite language|Kassite]] in [[Iran]], and [[Hattic language|Hattic]], [[Kaskian language|Kaskian]] and [[Hurro-Urartian languages|Hurro-Urartian]] in Turkey. The precise affiliation of these, and their date of arrival, remain topics of scholarly discussion. However, given lack of textual evidence for the earliest era of prehistory, this debate is unlikely to be resolved in the near future.

The evidence that does exist suggests that, by the third millennium BCE and into the second, several language groups already existed in the region. These included:{{sfn|Steadman|McMahon|2011|p=233}}{{sfn|Steadman|McMahon|2011|p=522}}{{sfn|Steadman|McMahon|2011|p=556}}{{sfn|Potts|2012|p=28}}{{sfn|Potts|2012|p=570}}{{sfn|Potts|2012|p=584}}
* [[Proto-Euphratean language]]: a hypothetical non-Semitic language previously hypothesized to be the [[Substrata (linguistics)|substratum]] language of the people that introduced farming into Southern [[Iraq]] in the Early [[Ubaid period]]. (5300–4700 BCE) The linguistic consensus today is that multiple unknown substrata contributed to the formation of the artifacts in Sumerian names that motivated the Proto-Euphratean substrate hypothesis, including fossilized archaic elements from earlier stages of Sumerian itself.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Rubio|first=Gonzalo|date=January 1999|title=On the Alleged "Pre-Sumerian Substratum"|journal=Journal of Cuneiform Studies|volume=51|pages=1–16|doi=10.2307/1359726|jstor=1359726|s2cid=163985956}}</ref> 
* [[Sumerian language|Sumerian]]: a non-Semitic [[language isolate]] that displays a [[Sprachbund]]-type relationship with neighbouring Semitic Akkadian
* [[Elamite language]]: a non-Semitic [[language isolate]]
* [[Semitic languages]]: [[Akkadian language|Akkadian]] (aka [[Assyrian people|Assyrian]] and [[Babylonian language|Babylonian]]), [[Eblaite language|Eblaite]], [[Amorite language|Amorite]], [[Aramaic language|Aramaic]], [[Ugaritic language|Ugaritic]], [[Canaanite languages]] (including [[Hebrew language|Hebrew]], [[Moabite language|Moabite]], [[Edomite language|Edomite]], [[Phoenician language|Phoenician]]/[[Carthaginian language|Carthaginian]])
* [[Hattic language|Hattic]]: a [[language isolate]], spoken originally in [[Central Anatolia Region|central Anatolia]]
* [[Indo-European languages]]: generally believed to be later intrusive languages arriving after 2000 BCE, such as [[Hittite language|Hittite]], [[Luwian language|Luwian]] and the [[Indo-Aryan languages|Indo-Aryan]] material attested in the [[Mitanni]] civilization, but recent evidence suggests that the language family emerged from the Fertile Crescent as early as 6000 BCE<ref>{{Cite journal|date=2023-07-28|title=Language trees with sampled ancestors support a hybrid model for the origin of Indo-European languages|journal=Science|language=en|volume=381|doi=10.1126/science.abg0818|hdl=10234/204329|hdl-access=free |last1=Heggarty |first1=Paul |last2=Anderson |first2=Cormac |last3=Scarborough |first3=Matthew |last4=King |first4=Benedict |last5=Bouckaert |first5=Remco |last6=Jocz |first6=Lechosław |last7=Kümmel |first7=Martin Joachim |last8=Jügel |first8=Thomas |last9=Irslinger |first9=Britta |last10=Pooth |first10=Roland |last11=Liljegren |first11=Henrik |last12=Strand |first12=Richard F. |last13=Haig |first13=Geoffrey |last14=MacÁk |first14=Martin |last15=Kim |first15=Ronald I. |last16=Anonby |first16=Erik |last17=Pronk |first17=Tijmen |last18=Belyaev |first18=Oleg |last19=Dewey-Findell |first19=Tonya Kim |last20=Boutilier |first20=Matthew |last21=Freiberg |first21=Cassandra |last22=Tegethoff |first22=Robert |last23=Serangeli |first23=Matilde |last24=Liosis |first24=Nikos |last25=Stroński |first25=Krzysztof |last26=Schulte |first26=Kim |last27=Gupta |first27=Ganesh Kumar |last28=Haak |first28=Wolfgang |last29=Krause |first29=Johannes |last30=Atkinson |first30=Quentin D. |issue=6656 |pages=eabg0818 |pmid=37499002 |url=http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:su:diva-220000 |display-authors=1 }}</ref>
* [[Egyptian language|Egyptian]]: a stand-alone branch of the [[Afroasiatic languages]] confined to [[Egypt]]
* [[Hurro-Urartian languages]], a small family. The [[Kassite language]] spoken in the northern part of the region may have belonged to this family.

Links between Hurro-Urartian and Hattic and the indigenous languages of the Caucasus have frequently been suggested, but are not generally accepted.