ABSTRACT
Hebrew is a member of the north-western branch of the Semitic family of languages. It started as one of many Canaanite dialects, but its beginnings as a language in its own right can be identified with the adoption of that dialect by the Israelites who settled in the Land of Israel in c. 1000 bc and who continued to use it during their periods of national independence (c. 1000 bc-587 bc and 517 bc-ad 70). Outside these periods of national independence, spoken Hebrew was replaced, first by Aramaic and Greek, then — when the Jews were forced to leave their land — by the various languages amongst whose speakers they settled. At the same time, wherever Jewish identity was not lost, Hebrew continued to be used as the language of religious rites and retained the prestige that goes with its status as the ‘Holy Tongue’, this being a mixture of Hebrew and Aramaic. It also continued to be used in a limited range of written functions. All later uses of the language were thus closely related to Jewish life and culture. Contact with other languages resulted in constant changes to its original form, including some of its most fundamental traits, especially as more and more of the languages in question were non-Semitic.
