Great Nubian Language

According to stone tools evidence found by archaeologists, the Nile Valley between the 1st and the 6th cataracts (between today's town of Aswan in Southern Egypt and Omdurman in Sudan, north of the capital Khartoum) was inhabited since at least half a million years, probably since much longer - up to 2 million years ago. As the region was very fertile during this whole period, and quite protected and isolated through the cataracts, it served as an ideal cradle for the development of civilization, and thus the Nubian language in its millennia-long evolution is one of the oldest permanently spoken languages in the World. Furthermore, the self-reliant, sociable and traditionalist nature of the Nubian population lets imagine that the roots of the Nubian language were developed since prehistoric times, although due to the absence of writing it can't be proven by scientists.The Nubian language, a direct descendent from Omotic - which is considered by linguists to be the root language, is part of the Afro-Asiatic, Nilo-Saharan language group, and linguists date it back to at least the 9th to 6th millennium B.C. Some scientists even believe it was the first structured language in the World. While the word "Adam" in most languages stand for a name, in Nubian "adam" means "human being". And the name "Eva" is presumed to have been derived from "ouwo", which means "two" in Nubian. The very limited influence of languages that passed the region due to conquests, administrative shifts as well as commercial and religious influences also reinforces the assumption that the Nubians preserved and protected their language since very ancient times. While Old Egyptian hieroglyphic inscriptions in Nubia predate the Meroitic writing, starting in the 8th century B.C., during the Kushite Meroitic Kingdom, many inscriptions in Meroitic - first written in hieroglyphics, later in Egyptian demotic script and finally in its own alphabet of 24 letters derived from Demotic appeared. The Meroitic texts refer mainly to funerary, administrative and royal writings; however, up to this day the Meroitic writing hasn't been fully deciphered, therefore we have only a basic knowledge of this language. Due to the close ties with Egypt, the Meroitic ruling elite was bilingual Meroitic and Egyptian. While some scholars doubt that Meroitic was the precursor of Old Nubian, others - like F.L. Griffiths - assume that Meroitic was related to Nubian, and possibly both variations of the language may have been spoken simultaneously, Meroitic being the language of the elite and administration while Nubian was the commonly spoken language.

There is evidence that In Southern Nubia, South of the 1st cataract, people were speaking a language different from Old Egyptian. Translators were present with the Egyptian rulers to connect with the local populations; also, some place names and surnames were Nubian, and inscriptions in the northern and southern sides of the door frame of the famous temple of Abu Simbel, built by Pharaoh Ramses II in 1244 B.C., refer to the North and the South in Nubian.

Archaeologists have found many inscriptions in Old Nubian from the Christian period since around AD 600, including a Bible - which was translated from Greek into Nubian - and many scrolls from Qasr Ibrim. After the Arabic conquest, the introduction of Islam and the fall of the Nubian kingdoms in the 13th and 14th century AD, writing of the Nubian language disappeared However, oral transfer of the language - and the relatively isolated location - helped preserve the Nubian language which continued to be spoken and taught throughout Nubia. However, the greatest challenge to the preservation of the language came after the repeated displacement of the Nubian population in Southern Egypt, due to the construction of successive dams and the submersion of large parts of Nubian lands under Lake Nasser (Lake Nubia). While some of the Nubians whose villages were flooded were relocated in a remote Arabic-speaking region east of Kom Ombo, many went to the cities in Egypt or traveled abroad in the search for work and for a living. In these environments, into which the Nubians had to struggle to adapt, the language faded very fast and many young Nubians today don't know their language of origin.

Thanks to huge efforts by Nubian scholars to revive the Nubian language and to teach it to the new generations, and the eagerness of researchers of Nubian heritage to present their art and traditions to a larger public, Nubian experiences a resurge in interest and was saved from oblivion. We encourage all Nubians and friends of Nubian Art to promote the conservation of this wonderful melodious language.