Classical Armenian
Sign in to saveAlso known as Old Armenian, Liturgical Armenian, Grabar, Krapar
oldest attested form of the Armenian language
Key facts
- Region
- Armenian Highlands
- Era
- developed into Middle Armenian
- Language family
- Indo-European Classical Armenian
- Early form
- Proto-Armenian
- Writing system
- Armenian alphabet ( Classical Armenian orthography )
- Iso 639 3
- xcl
- Glottolog
- clas1249
- Linguasphere
- 57-AAA-aa
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- historical language
- Subclass of
- Armenian
- Country
- Armenia
- Followed by
- Middle Armenian
- Follows
- Proto-Armenian
Show 7 more facts
- writing system
- Armenian alphabet
- linguistic typology
- subject–verb–object
- native label
- գրաբար
- used by
- Armenian Catholic Church
- topic's main category
- Category:Classical Armenian
- Commons category
- Classical Armenian
via Wikidata · CC0
~6 min read
Encyclopedic overview
Classical Armenian (Armenian: գրաբար, romanized: grabar, Eastern Armenian pronunciation [ɡəɾɑˈpʰɑɾ], Western Armenian pronunciation [kʰəɾɑˈpʰɑɾ]; meaning "literary [language]"; also Old Armenian or Liturgical Armenian) is the oldest attested form of the Armenian language. It was first written down at the beginning of the 5th century, and most Armenian literature from then through the 18th century is in Classical Armenian. Many ancient manuscripts originally written in Ancient Greek, Hebrew, Syriac and Latin survive only in Armenian translation. Classical Armenian itself, in turn, was heavily influenced by the Iranian languages, in particular by Parthian.
Classical Armenian continues to be the liturgical language of the Armenian Apostolic Church and the Armenian Catholic Church and is often learned by Biblical, Intertestamental, and Patristic scholars dedicated to textual studies. Classical Armenian is also important for the reconstruction of the Proto-Indo-European language.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Classical Armenian” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.