| Hunnic | |
|---|---|
| Native to | Hunnic Empire |
| Region | From Eurasian steppe into Europe |
| Ethnicity | Huns |
| Extinct | after 469 |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | xhc |
xhc | |
| Glottolog | None |
 The extent of the Huns, and a rough map of the extent of the Hunnic language | |
The Hunnic language, or Hunnish, was the language spoken by Huns in the Hunnic Empire, a heterogeneous, multi-ethnic tribal confederation which invaded Eastern and Central Europe, and ruled most of Pannonian Eastern Europe, during the 4th and 5th centuries CE. A variety of languages were spoken within the Hun Empire.[1] A contemporary report by Priscus has that Hunnish was spoken alongside Gothic and the languages of other tribes subjugated by the Huns.[2]
As no inscriptions or whole sentences in the Hunnic language have been preserved, the attested corpus is very limited, consisting almost entirely of proper names in Greek and Latin sources.[3]
There is no consensus on the classification of the Hunnish language,[4] but due to the origin of these proper names it has been compared with Turkic,[5][6] Mongolic, Iranian,[7] and Yeniseian languages,[8] and with various Indo-European languages.[9] Other scholars consider the available evidence inconclusive and the Hunnish language therefore unclassifiable.[10]
- ^ Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 377.
- ^ Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 382.
- ^ Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 376.
- ^ Ball 2021, p. 170.
- ^ Pronk-Tiethoff 2013, p. 58.
- ^ Kim 2013, p. 30.
- ^ Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 390–391.
- ^ Vajda, Edward J. (2013). Yeniseian Peoples and Languages: A History of Yeniseian Studies with an Annotated Bibliography and a Source Guide. Oxford/New York: Routledge.
- ^ Maenchen-Helfen 1973, pp. 424–426.
- ^ Doerfer 1973, p. 50; Golden 1992, pp. 88–89; Sinor 1997, p. 336; Róna-Tas 1999, p. 208.