The Akkadian language is the oldest Semitic language that has been preserved to this day. It belongs to the Semitic family of languages, alongside other languages such as Arabic, Aramaic, Hebrew, Classical Ethiopian, or even Modern Maltese.
The Akkadian language takes its name from the Akkadians, a people who dominated ancient Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq) for several centuries during the third millennium BCE. Towards the end of the third millennium and the beginning of the second, this people - or simply their language - seems to have split into two mainly geographical sections.
The first section inhabited the regions of present-day northern Iraq and developed into what is known as the Assyrian Empire. Their people, the Assyrians, spoke a dialect of Akkadian that we call the Assyrian language. The second section inhabited more southern areas and evolved into the Babylonian Empire. Their people, the Babylonians, spoke a dialect of Akkadian that we refer to as the Babylonian language.
Both the Assyrian and Babylonian dialects evolved over time and took various forms, interacting with the languages of other cultures. This present work presents an overview of the grammar of the Akkadian language, with more emphasis on its Babylonian dialects, in which some of the most significant texts of Mesopotamian literature have been preserved.
