ABSTRACT
This is a chapter where we will explore what the field knows about the meta-linguistic situation before Islam. We will start with the general attitudes that traditional Arab, modern Arab and Western scholars alike have towards the linguistic situation in the peninsula in late antiquity. We will then discuss the different positions about the functions of the dialects and the position of the pre-Classical Arabic in this situation. I will end the chapter suggesting that the pre-Classical variety was a language of art only. This is a mere suggestion. The data is not conclusive, and scholars are not in agreement about it either.
