The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World's Ancient Languages

1. Introduction Roger D. Woodard; 2. Sumerian Piotr Michalowski; 3. Elamite Matthew W. Stolper; 4. Hurrian Gernot Wilhelm; 5. Urartian Gernot Wilhelm; 6. Afro-Asiatic John Huehnergard; 7. Egyptian and Coptic Antonio Loprieno; 8. Akkadian and Eblaite John Huehnergard and Christopher Woods; 9. Ugaritic Dennis Pardee; 10. Hebrew P. Kyle McCarter, Jr.; 11. Phoenician and Punic Jo Ann Hackett; 12. Canaanite Dialects Dennis Pardee; 13. Aramaic Stuart Creason; 14. Ge'ez (Aksum) Gene Gragg; 15. Old South Arabian Norbert Nebes and Peter Stein; 16. Ancient North Arabian M. C. A. Macdonald; 17. Indo-European Henry M. Hoenigswald and J. P. T. Clackson; 18. Hittite Calvert Watkins; 19. Luvian H. Craig Melchert; 20. Palaic H. Craig Melchert; 21. Lycian H. Craig Melchert; 22. Lydian H. Craig Melchert; 23. Carian H. Craig Melchert; 24. Attic Greek Roger D. Woodard; 25. Greek Dialects Roger D. Woodard; 26. Sanskrit Stephanie W. Jamison; 27. Middle Indic Stephanie W. Jamison; 28. Old Persian Rüdiger Schmitt; 29. Avestan Mark Hale; 30. Pahlavi Mark Hale; 31. Phrygian Claude Brixhe; 32. Latin J. P. T. Clackson; 33. Sabellian Rex E. Wallace; 34. Venetic Rex E. Wallace; 35. Continental Celtic Joseph F. Eska; 36. Gothic Jay H. Jasanoff; 37. Early Northwest Germanic Jan Terje Faarlund; 38. Classical Armenia J. P. T. Clackson; 39. Etruscan Helmut Rix; 40. Early Georgian Kevin Tuite; 41. Ancient Chinese Alain Peyraube; 42. Old Tamil Sanford B. Steever; 43. Mayan Victoria R. Bricker; 44. Epi-Olmec Terrence Kaufman and John Justeson; 45. Reconstructed Ancient Languages Don Ringe.

Roger D. Woodard is the Andrew V. V. Raymond Professor of the Classics at the University of Buffalo. Among his other books are Greek Writing from Knossos to Homer: A Linguistic Interpretation of the Origin of the Greek Alphabet (1997, Oxford); Ovid's Fasti (with A. J. Boyle, 2000, Penguin); and On Interpreting Morphological Change (1990, Gieben).

'This tome on our world's ancient communication offers a detailed and practical insight into each language, including writing, phonology and lexicon.' Good Book Guide '... a deeply interesting, even fascinating, work ...' Times Higher Education Supplement 'I have taken my time over reviewing this title simply because I found it so fascinating that I kept being sidetracked into other languages ... One thing that any broad-ranging reference book compiled to rigorously applied standard criteria does is to put the familiar into a new perspective: so the chapters on Latin and Greek treat those two 'major"languages in the same way as the others and allow, in fact encourage, genuinely comparative study ... the level of detail given in this handbook will satisfy many requirements ... academic in the best sense.' Reference Reviews 'Every serious library should have a copy in its reference collection, and many serious scholars will enjoy dipping into it and finding out just how linguistically diverse the ancient world really was.' Bryn Mawr Classical Review 'Woodard has done the scholarly world a great service ... This book fills a distinct void ... Highly recommended.' Library Journal 'A practical amd useful overview... we may well congratulate the editor with a really encylopaedic work...' Boekbesprekingen 'Written and organized clearly and concisely, this scholarly work contains a wealth of information about the languages of antiquity ... Essential.' Choice