- What was the first language in the world?
- Sumerian – the first written language in the world
- Tamil – the oldest “living” language in the world
- Hebrew – a language that returned after centuries
- What is the oldest language in Europe?
Linguists have long tried to determine what the first language in the world was. The desire to solve this fascinating puzzle stems from a curiosity about the origins of human communication, as well as the need to identify a common cultural denominator. The question “what is the oldest language in the world” raises more doubts than answers, since the history of spoken language began thousands of years before the invention of writing. Researchers trying to answer this question therefore rely mainly on the oldest surviving texts and oral traditions.
What was the first language in the world?
Anyone wondering what the first language in the world was is unlikely to receive a definitive answer. This is because human speech developed in parallel across different communities, long before writing systems emerged. Reconstructing the earliest forms of speech is based primarily on archaeological evidence and comparative analysis of modern languages. There is no written trace of any language that can be definitively called the first. Speech likely originated over 100,000 years ago, while writing has only been around for several thousand years.
For this reason, the oldest language in the world is typically defined as either the first one recorded in writing or a language that has survived to the present day in an unbroken form. This distinction allows us to separate “archaeological” languages, learned from clay tablets, from “living” languages still used in daily communication. One theory proposes the existence of a so-called proto-language from which all known languages descended, but this remains a hypothesis that cannot be confirmed.
Sumerian – the first written language in the world
If we base our answer on written records, then Sumerian holds the title. Tablets from Uruk and Umma, dated to around 3500 BCE, contain words and sentences written in cuneiform script. The Sumerians used this script to record transactions, laws, prayers, and even literature. After two thousand years, Sumerian was replaced by Akkadian, but it continued to be taught in temple schools as a liturgical language until the 1st century BCE, allowing thousands of texts to survive. Based on these sources, many scholars consider Sumerian the first written language in the world.
Tamil – the oldest “living” language in the world
If we ask which is the oldest language still in use today, the answer is Tamil. Nearly 80 million people speak it, mainly in Sri Lanka, Singapore, and the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Tamil has a documented history stretching back over 2,000 years, with the oldest literary texts dating from around the 3rd century BCE. Despite the passage of time, the language has retained many archaic features, and modern speakers can still read and understand ancient texts. This is why Tamil is often considered the oldest living language in the world.
Hebrew – a language that returned after centuries
Hebrew is also among the languages considered for the title of the oldest. Often associated with the biblical language of Adam, Hebrew wasn’t the first language in the world, but it holds deep cultural and religious significance. It was the language of the ancient Jews and has been in use since at least the 10th century BCE. Over time, it ceased to be spoken in daily life and was used only in liturgy and religious texts. In the 19th century, thanks to the Zionist movement, Hebrew was revived. Today, it is the official language of Israel and the mother tongue of millions. The story of Hebrew proves that a language can come back to life after centuries of dormancy, making it a unique case in global history.
What is the oldest language in Europe?
There is no clear-cut answer to the question of what the oldest European language is. Several languages are often considered, including Basque, Greek, and Lithuanian.
Interestingly, Basque does not belong to any known language family and is seen as a linguistic relic from pre-Indo-European times. It has survived to this day.
Greek has the longest documented literary continuity in Europe. Its first written forms, in Linear B script, date from the 15th to 12th centuries BCE. Greek is still spoken today, though it has evolved considerably.
Lithuanian, on the other hand, has preserved many archaic features that it shares with Sanskrit and other ancient Indo-European languages.
Depending on the criteria, each of these languages could be considered the oldest in Europe.
As we can see, it’s extremely difficult to answer the question of what the first language in the world was. Many linguists believe this question may never have a definitive answer, simply because there’s no evidence from the pre-writing era. Any conclusion drawn is therefore hypothetical. Scholars search for clues using comparative statistics, analysing similarities between different languages and tracking historical migrations. But this often leads to the conclusion that there probably was no single “first language.” Rather, there were several early dialects that gradually shaped the linguistic diversity we see today.