Editing Proto-Semitic language (section)

==Linguistic homeland==
{{See also|Proto-Afroasiatic homeland}}
Since all modern Semitic languages can be traced back to a common ancestor, [[Semiticist]]s have placed importance on locating the ''Urheimat'' of the Proto-Semitic language.<ref name=Lipinski42>{{Harvnb|Lipiński|2001|pp=42}}</ref> The linguistic homeland of the Proto-Semitic language may be considered within the context of the larger Afro-Asiatic family to which it belongs.

The previously popular hypothesis of an Arabian ''Urheimat'' has been largely abandoned since the region could not have supported massive waves of emigration before the [[domestication]] of [[camels]] in the 2nd millennium BC.<ref name=Lipinski42/>

There is also evidence that Mesopotamia and adjoining areas of modern Syria were originally inhabited by a non-Semitic population. Non-Semitic [[toponymy|toponyms]] preserved in Akkadian and Eblaite suggest this.

=== Levant hypothesis ===
A [[Bayesian inference|Bayesian analysis]] performed in 2009 suggests an origin for all known Semitic languages in the Levant around 3750 BC, with a later single introduction from [[South Arabia]] into the [[Horn of Africa]] around 800 BC. This statistical analysis could not, however, estimate when or where the ancestor of all Semitic languages diverged from Afroasiatic.<ref name="Kitchen2009">{{cite journal|last1=Kitchen|first1=A.|last2=Ehret|first2=C.|last3=Assefa|first3=S.|last4=Mulligan|first4=C. J.|title=Bayesian phylogenetic analysis of Semitic languages identifies an Early Bronze Age origin of Semitic in the Near East|journal=Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences|date=29 April 2009|volume=276|issue=1668|pages=2703–10|doi=10.1098/rspb.2009.0408|pmc=2839953|pmid=19403539}}</ref> It thus neither contradicts nor confirms the hypothesis that the divergence of ancestral Semitic from Afroasiatic occurred in Africa.

[[File:BayesianSemiticMap.jpg|thumb|Map of Semitic languages and statistically inferred dispersals. One hypothesized location of the divergence of ancestral Semitic from Afroasiatic between the African coast of the Red Sea and the Near East is also indicated.]]
In another variant of the theory, the earliest wave of Semitic speakers entered the [[Fertile Crescent]] via the [[Levant]] and eventually founded the [[Akkadian Empire]]. Their relatives, the [[Amorites]], followed them and settled Syria before 2500 BC.<ref name="Lipinski44">{{Harvnb|Lipiński|2001|pp=44}}</ref> [[Late Bronze Age collapse]] in [[Israel]] led the [[South Semitic languages|South Semites]] to move southwards where they settled the highlands of [[Yemen]] after the 20th century BC until those crossed [[Bab-el-Mandeb]] to the [[Horn of Africa]] between 1500 and 500 BC.<ref name="Lipinski44" />