Extinct Nubian language of northern Sudan and southern Egypt
Old Nubian
Native to
Egypt, Sudan
Region
Along the banks of the Nile in Lower and Upper Nubia (southern Egypt and northern Sudan)
Era
8th–15th century; evolved into Nobiin.
Language family
Nilo-Saharan?
Eastern Sudanic
Northern Eastern
Nubian
Old Nubian
Writing system
Nubian
Language codes
ISO 639-3
onw
Linguist List
onw
Glottolog
oldn1245
A page from an Old Nubian translation of the Investiture of the Archangel Michael, from the 9th–10th century, found at Qasr Ibrim, now at the British Museum. Michael's name appears in red with a characteristic epenthetic -ⲓ.
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Old Nubian (also called Middle Nubian or Old Nobiin) is an extinct Nubian language, attested in writing from the 8th to the 15th century AD. It is ancestral to modern-day Nobiin and closely related to Dongolawi and Kenzi. It was used throughout the kingdom of Makuria, including the eparchy of Nobatia. The language is preserved in more than a hundred pages of documents and inscriptions, both of a religious nature (homilies, prayers, hagiographies, psalms, lectionaries), and related to the state and private life (legal documents, letters), written using adaptation of the Coptic alphabet.
question marks, boxes, or other symbols. OldNubian (also called Middle Nubian or Old Nobiin) is an extinct Nubian language, attested in writing from the...
The Nubian languages (Arabic: لُغَات نُوبِيّة, romanized: lughāt nūbiyyah) are a group of related languages spoken by the Nubians. In the past, Nubian languages...
Nubians (/ˈnuːbiənz, ˈnjuː-/) (Nobiin: Nobī, Arabic: النوبيون) are a Nilo-Saharan ethnic group indigenous to the region which is now Northern Sudan and...
Nubia spoke at least two varieties of Nubian languages, a subfamily that includes Nobiin (the descendant of OldNubian), Dongolawi, Midob and several related...
(Northern Sudan and Southern Egypt) in the Middle Ages. It is attested in OldNubian documents from the 12th to the 15th centuries. It is one of the last attested...
"(language) of the Nubians". Another term used is Noban tamen, meaning "the Nubian language". At least 2500 years ago, the first Nubian speakers migrated...
Old Dongola (OldNubian: ⲧⲩⲛⲅⲩⲗ, Tungul; Arabic: دنقلا العجوز, Dunqulā al-ʿAjūz) is a deserted town in what is now Northern State, Sudan, located on the...
The Nubian ibex (Capra nubiana) is a desert-dwelling goat species (Genus Capra) found in mountainous areas of northern and northeast Africa, and the Middle...
Cursive script were replaced by Byzantine Greek, Coptic, and OldNubian. The OldNubian script, derived of the Uncial Greek script, added three Meroitic...
U+A60F ꘏ VAI QUESTION MARK U+2CFA ⳺ COPTIC OLDNUBIAN DIRECT QUESTION MARK, and U+2CFB ⳻ COPTIC OLDNUBIAN INDIRECT QUESTION MARK U+1945 ᥅ LIMBU QUESTION...
own right. Due to the lack of Nubian texts and artifacts prior to their interactions with Egyptians, much of early Nubian religion is still unclear. Fortunately...
The Bible was translated into OldNubian during the period when Christianity was dominant in Nubia (southern Egypt and northern Sudan). Throughout the...
morphological features in OldNubian. Two examples are: Meroitic: ⟨m(a)s(a)-l(a)⟩ "the sun" → OldNubian: mašal "sun" and OldNubian: -lo (focus particle)...
be used to build domes, as in the example below from Cameroon. The age-oldNubian vault technique was notably revived by the Egyptian architect Hassan Fathy...
Christianization of the three Nubian kingdoms Nobatia, Makuria, and Alodia in the sixth century. As a result of Christianization, the OldNubian language stands as...
Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Assamese and Greenlandic have eight; OldNubian had nine; Basque has 13; Estonian has 14; Finnish has 15; Hungarian has...
This is the earliest Egyptian reference to Kush; the Nubian region had gone by other names in the Old Kingdom. Under Thutmose I, Egypt made several campaigns...
fragment. An Old Ossetic inscription of the 10th–12th centuries found in Arxyz, the oldest known attestation of an Ossetic language. The OldNubian language...
⳹ COPTIC OLDNUBIAN FULL STOP U+2CF9 Po, other Coptic ⳺ COPTIC OLDNUBIAN DIRECT QUESTION MARK U+2CFA Po, other Coptic ⳻ COPTIC OLDNUBIAN INDIRECT QUESTION...
be favored over the traditional, simple hairstyles of the Old and Middle Kingdoms. Nubian wigs, which Ancient Egyptians grew fond of during the Amarna...
number of other translations were added (in some cases partial), including OldNubian, Sogdian, Arabic and Slavonic languages, among others. Jerome's 4th-century...
Chinyanja, Bible was translated by William Percival Johnson in 1912. This older version is bound as Buku Lopatulika. The Bible Society of Malawi records...
codices found at Nag Hammadi used the Coptic script. The OldNubian alphabet—used to write OldNubian, a Nilo-Saharan language—is an uncial variant of the...
others were written not long after the saint's demise. Fragments from an OldNubian hagiography of Saint Michael are extant. Jewish hagiographic writings...
Nubia: Writing: The Basic Languages of Christian Nubia: Greek, Coptic, OldNubian, and Arabic". ancientsudan.org. Archived from the original on 5 January...
Qasr Ibrim (Arabic: قصر ابريم; Meroitic: Pedeme; OldNubian: Silimi; Coptic: ⲡⲣⲓⲙ Prim; Latin: Primis) is an archaeological site in Lower Nubia, located...
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