Osco-Umbrian languages

Osco-Umbrian
Sabellic, Sabellian
Geographic
distribution
Ancient south and central Italy
Extinct1st millennium BC-1st millennium AD
Linguistic classificationIndo-European
Early forms
Subdivisions
Language codes
Glottologsabe1249
Ethnolinguistic map of Italy in the Iron Age, before the Roman expansion and conquest of Italy

The Osco-Umbrian, Sabellic or Sabellian languages are an extinct group of Italic languages, the Indo-European languages that were spoken in Central and Southern Italy by the Osco-Umbrians before being replaced by Latin, as the power of Ancient Rome expanded. Their written attestations developed from the middle of the 1st millennium BC to the early centuries of the 1st millennium AD. The languages are known almost exclusively from inscriptions, principally of Oscan and Umbrian, but there are also some Osco-Umbrian loanwords in Latin. Besides the two major branches of Oscan and Umbrian (and their dialects), South Picene may represent a third branch of Sabellic.[1] The whole linguistic Sabellic area, however, might be considered a dialect continuum. Paucity of evidence from most of the "minor dialects" contributes to the difficulty of making these determinations.

  1. ^ Helmut Rix Sabellische Texte: Die Texte des Oskischen, Umbrischen und Südpikenischen. Heidelberg: Carl Winter University Press, 2002 pp4f