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Concept
Coptic language
Summary
Coptic (Bohairic Coptic: , ) is an Egyptian language family of closely related dialects, representing the most recent developments of the Egyptian language, and historically spoken by the Copts, starting from the third century AD in Roman Egypt. Coptic was supplanted by Arabic as the primary spoken language of Egypt following the Muslim conquest of Egypt and was slowly replaced over the centuries. Coptic has no native speakers today, although it remains in daily use as the liturgical language of the Coptic Orthodox Church and of the Coptic Catholic Church. Innovations in grammar, phonology, and the influx of Greek loanwords distinguish Coptic from earlier periods of the Egyptian language. It is written with the Coptic alphabet, a modified form of the Greek alphabet with several additional letters borrowed from the Demotic Egyptian script.
The major Coptic dialects are Sahidic, Bohairic, Akhmimic, Fayyumic, Lycopolitan, and Oxyrhynchite. Sahidic Coptic was spoken between the cities of Asyut and Oxyrhynchus and flourished as a literary language across Egypt in the period 325-800 AD. Bohairic, the language of the Nile Delta, gained prominence in the 9th century and is the dialect used by the Coptic Church. Despite being closely related, Coptic dialects differ from one another in terms of their phonology, morphology, syntax, and vocabulary.
In Coptic the language is called () "Egyptian" or () "the Egyptian language". Coptic also possessed the term () "Egyptian", derived from Greek Αἰγύπτιος (). This was borrowed into Arabic as قبْط (), and from there into the languages of Europe, giving rise to words like French copte and English Copt.
Coptic is today spoken liturgically in the Coptic Orthodox and Coptic Catholic Church (along with Modern Standard Arabic). The language is spoken only in Egypt and historically has had little influence outside of the territory, except for monasteries located in Nubia. Coptic's most noticeable linguistic impact has been on the various dialects of Egyptian Arabic, which is characterised by a Coptic substratum in lexical, morphological, syntactical, and phonological features.
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