Ancient Classical Languages That Have Fallen Silent

Dec21,2025

One of the world’s earliest written languages, used in ancient Mesopotamia; survived later only in religious and scholarly texts.

Sumerian 

A major Semitic language of ancient Mesopotamia, written in cuneiform and later replaced by Aramaic.

Akkadian

An Indo-European language spoken in ancient Anatolia, preserved on clay tablets using cuneiform script.

Hittite

An extinct Indo-European language family once spoken along the Silk Road in Central Asia.

Tocharian (A & B)

Used in ancient Elam (modern-day Iran), with no clear linguistic relatives.

Elamite

Spoken in parts of the Near East, particularly northern Mesopotamia and Anatolia.

Hurrian

A language of the Iron Age kingdom of Urartu, related to Hurrian but otherwise isolated.

Urartian

The language of the Etruscan civilization of pre-Roman Italy, partially deciphered but extinct.

Classical Etruscan