Languages in the Near East

Egyptian lies geographically and in its position as language between two major families of languages:

Semitic - the family of language on which many languages of the Near East are based (including Arabic)
Hamitic - the family of languages spoken in North-east Africa

The two families together are often called Afroasiatic

Examples:

Egyptian	Hamitic	Semitic
ink (anok) - I	aniga (Somali)	anaku (Akkadian)
gemi - to find	egmi (Tuareg - to look for)
khenet - face, front	hancii (Hausa - nose)	khanna (Arabic - speak nasally)
jan - baboon	yani (Bantu - kind of ape)
semu - pasture, plant		shamu (Akkadian)

Takács 1999 (an etymological dictonary of Egyptian)

Map showing important languages in the Near East (at about 2000- 1000 BC) and North East Africa (about AD 1000-2000). Because of the lack of written sources in most areas, it is hard to trace the origins of African languages in detail.

After each language name on the map, is written in brackets the language family to which it belongs.

map of languages