Once upon a time, before civilizations were formed, the kingdoms were established, and before the norms of society were created, humans used to communicate using hand gestures and primitive oral sounds. The concept of languages emerged about 10,000 years ago and it changed the course of humanity. It is the use of languages that led to the development of the human race and took us where we are today. Though the origin of the first-ever language is highly debated throughout the world, certain ancient scriptures and cave carvings reveal some of the oldest languages in the world.
1.Tamil (5000 years old)
Spoken by 78 million people and the official language in Sri Lanka and Singapore, Tamil is the oldest language in the world. It is the only ancient language that has survived all the way to the modern world. Tamil is the most widely spoken language in the state of Tamil Nadu and is also one of the official languages of India.
2. Sanskrit (5000 years old)
Unlike Tamil, which is still a widely spoken language, Sanskrit is the oldest language in the world but fell out of common usage around 600 B.C. It is now a liturgical language. The holy languages are found in the scriptures of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism.
3.Egyptian (5000 years old)
Egypt is considered to be one of the oldest civilizations in the world, and Egyptian Coptic is the oldest indigenous language of Egypt. Written records of its usage date back to 3400 BC, making it an ancient language. Coptic was the most widely spoken language in Egypt till the late 17th century AD until it was replaced by Egyptian Arabic, post-Muslim invasion. Coptic is still used as the liturgical language of the Coptic Church in Egypt. Only a handful of people fluently speaks the language today.
4.Greek (2900 years old)
Greek is the official language of Greece and Cyprus and was first spoken in Greece and Asia Minor, Which is now a part of Turkey. Greek has an uninterrupted history of being used as a written language for over 3,000 years, which is longer than any other Indo-European language spoken today. This history is divided into three stages, Ancient Greek, Medieval Greek, and Modern Greek.
5. Farsi (2500 years old)
Farsi is the common language spoken in modern-day Iran, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan. Farsi is the direct descendant of the Old Persian language, which was the official language of the Persian Empire. Modern Persian emerged around 800 CE, and it has changed sparsely since then. Speakers of the Persian language could pick up a piece of writing from 900 CE and read it with comparatively less difficulty than an English speaker could read the English texts from the times of Shakespeare for instance.
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