In reply to message #0
Shlama Akhi Dean, Actually, what is known as the 'Assyrian' language is called Akkadian...there was never really a language distinctively Assyrian....the Assyrians were a Semitic people who migrated to the area of Nineveh from Babylon, so in reality the Assyrians and Babylonians were 1 ethnicity, and they spoke the same language. Akkadian was first spoken in the small city-state called Akkad, which was in southern Mesopotamia near Ur. King Sargon of Akkad built the first empire, and many centuries later the Babylonian and Assyrian kingdoms were founded, but they both spoke Akkadian, with somewhat different dialects, but very intelligible to each other. Akkadian is related to Aramaic, being a Semitic language, but it has a far older history in writing. The 2 languages are related, but they also are very different. Akkadian is now, of course, dead - and has been for nearly 3,000 years. When the Assyrian empire began to grow westward, and absorb the neighboring Aramean kingdoms around Damascus and the Levant, the Assyrians adopted Aramaic as the official language of the empire, which made it easier to govern the conquered peoples - which far outnumbered them. Also, a common practice of the Assyrian monarchs was to deport large populations of conquered peoples (sound familiar?  ), and this helped to prevent rebellions and revolts. When they brought all these Aramaic-speaking people into Assyria proper, it was necessary to adopt their language as well. At first, the two languages lived side by side and were used for different purposes within the empire. Akkadian remained the language of choice for religious and historical texts (like the Epic of Gilgamesh), but Aramaic was used for everyday commerce and business transactions. Akkadian was only written in cuneiform (with hundreds of letters), while Aramaic began as cuneiform but later switched to a written alphabet of 22 letters. Interestingly, Akkadian was written from left to right (the only Semitic language to ever have done so) and had the vowels!!!! But, nevertheless, Akkadian soon died out as a spoken and written language (it was pretty much dead by the time of Nebuchadnezzar). In answer to your other question, how different they could have been, they were pretty different - but also in many aspects somewhat the same. Much of the vocabulary in Aramaic originated from Akkadian, and hence has wound up also in Hebrew and Arabic. Check out the following page, by John Heise. it is a great resource on Akkadian:
https://saturn.sron.ruu.nl/%7Ejheise/akkadian/
Shlama w'Burkate,
Paul
>Shlama l'kulkhon,
>
>I was reviewing a near eastern
>history book and noticed that
>the author(s) continually drew distinctions
>between the Aramaic Language and
>the Assyrian Language.
>
>How different could these two languages
>have been?
>
>If the ancient Assyrians spoke a
>different language than the Arameans,
>and later adopted the Aramean's
>language, then what happened to
>the Assyrian Language?
>
>Thanks,
>
>Dean
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, Dec-02-2000 at 10:34 PM, (1)
