阿拉米语(Aramaic language)

闪米特中北部语支或西北语支语言，原来是古代阿拉米人所使用。最早的阿拉米文字是用腓尼基字母拼写的，在黎凡特（Levant）北部发现，年代可追溯至西元前850～西元前600年，西元前600～西元前200年阿拉米语大为扩张，发展成一种标准形式，称帝国阿拉米语。後来几个世纪变成一种语言典型，称「标准文学阿拉米语」。後（古典）阿拉米语（约西元200～1200年）有丰富的文献资料，包含古叙利亚语和曼达语（参阅Mandaenism）在内。随伊斯兰教的兴起，阿拉伯语迅速在西南亚一带取代阿拉米语的地位。现代（新）阿拉米语包含西新阿拉米语和东新阿拉米语，前者通行於大马士革东北部的三个村落，後者通行於土耳其东南部、伊拉克北部和伊朗西北部散居的犹太人和基督徒聚落，居住在阿拉伯河的现代曼达派人也使用东新阿拉米语。约自1900年以来遭到迫害後，大部分操东新阿拉米语的人（约有数十万人）分散到全世界各个角落。

English version：

Aramaic language

NW Semitic language, originally spoken by the ancient Aramaeans. The earliest Aramaic texts are inscriptions in an alphabet of Phoenician origin found in the northern Levant dating from c. 850-600 BC. The period 600-200 BC saw a dramatic expansion of Aramaic, leading to the development of a standard form known as Imperial Aramaic. In later centuries, as “Standard Literary Aramaic,” it became a linguistic model. Late (or Classical) Aramaic (c. AD 200-1200) has an abundant literature, both in Syriac and in Mandaic (see Mandaeanism). With the rise of Islam, Arabic rapidly supplanted Aramaic as a vernacular in South Asia. Modern Aramaic (Neo-Aramaic) comprises West Neo-Aramaic, spoken in three villages northeast of Damascus, and East Neo-Aramaic, a group of languages spoken in scattered settlements of Jews and Christians in southeastern Turkey, northern Iraq and northwestern Iran, and by modern Mandaeans in the Shatt al Arab. Since c. 1900 persecution has forced most contemporary East Neo-Aramaic-speakers, who number several hundred thousand, into diaspora communities dispersed around the world.