> What's the oldest written language in the world?And the answer: Sumerian. Sumerian is the oldest written language in existence. Dating back 5,000 years,it was the language of the people of Sumer[https://www.askqotd.com/the-cradle-of-civilization/] in ancient Mesopotamia,which was located in what is now Iraq. At the time, people would write on wetclay tablets with a sharp object, and the tablets were then baked or left in thesun to harden.Photo credit: public domain.Sumerian has been traced back to 3100 BCE inMesopotamia, and was primarily used to conduct business. While it is recognizedas the oldest written language today, Archaic Sumerian continues to be difficultto interpret and is poorly understood — since it was in use some 5,000 yearsago, many resources have been lost to time. The Classical period of the Sumerian language lasted from around 2500 to 2300BCE. Much of our knowledge of the transactions made during this time come againfrom business, royal inscription, and even letters (both private and public).Although the Akkadian invasion of Babylonia set the language back, the recordsfrom this time period are extensive enough to construct more of an understandingof Sumerian grammar and vocabulary. Sumerian continued to be spoken and writtenup until the Babylonian identity took shape, at which point the last of theSumerian written language was written in cuneiform. However, the Sumerian language was lost around 4-6 BCE. A lack of information onearly Sumerians meant that ancient historians had no means of understanding therole that Sumer held in early civilizations, and no means to decipher cuneiform.In the early 19th century, early decipherment of cuneiform led scholars to anovel realization: by creating better understanding the texts written inBabylonian, there emerged a newfound understanding of texts written in alanguage different from Babylonian. Ultimately, it was determined to be earlySumerian.