Disscussion; Languages in Alt Maghreb

Random interrogation and possible fluff-ideas for cultural atl;

an obscure point of history to me is the languages portrait of pre-Islam maghreb - Libya, Tunisia, Morrocco, Algeria, around... And pertaining to it, how it would evolves if Islam never existed at all, or never came to the region (early).

I presumes Berber familly languages like Kabyle thrived, or better before Islam and it's importance focus on Arabic came (or so berber nationalism seems to point at). Punic, the 'dialect' (?) of Phoenician semitic language of Carthage, was still alive in early Christian era, I heard, probably limited to modern Tunisia.

But I have no idea HOW important had been the Latinification of the region/provinces - was Latin known well? By who - scholars and official only, a lingua franca of the elite, or the people knew it well?

And did the Vandals brought their Germanic language (Gothic branch?), did it thrive or even survive the short lived kingdom?

And was there other languages, like Greek, some Egyptian?

I wonder then, as well according to those meager question... what would be the linguistic milieux of a pagan-christian Maghreb?

Would Berber languages be rulling? A Maghrebian/Punic Romance language would appears? Punic survive?
 
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I believe Punic was still spoken, but not a lot anymore.
The African Romance language was spoken a lot in Northern Africa.
In Egypt people spoke Greek and Coptic I think.
 
There's records hinting people spoke some version of Latin in southern Tunisia until at least the 12th century.
 
As far as I know, Greek was spoken in Cyrenaica, and among the elites of Egypt. Coptic was spoken by the majority of the Egyptians. The Latin language(s) dominated the urban landscape west of Cyreneaica and to a lesser extent, the peasants along the coast. Berber was spoken mainly in the desert regions.

The language of the Vandals was short-lived and even when te Vandals were in power, it was only spoken among the elite.
 
Punic would had probably gone extinct or become marginalized as a language spoken by the people even if there is no Islamic conquest of North Africa. The reason that it became extinct is because a lot of the Punic speakers switched over to the language of their conquerers, Arabic, a fellow Semitic language. It was not that big a jump to switch languages. I'm not sure how many people spoke the language though St. Augustine did note it was an important language to learn I suppose. African Romance is likely to become dominant. I don't know about the Berber languages but they'll probably do a bit better though that need to switch to Arabic would probably be switched with a need to switch to using Latin as the high prestige language.

Vandalic? It wasn't going to survive.
 
http://wold.livingsources.org/vocabulary/6

The link is purported to be a record of word origins for the Rifian Berber language. Each word is marked on a scale from 1-5 with 1 being "clearly borrowed" and from which language, and 5 being "no evidence" of borrowing.

So this might help you see what words you wouldn't have if there was no Arabic for instance, and what words come from other languages.

Not perfect, but a start and I use it myself for RoS.
 
I doubt Punic would have survived much longer than it did OTL, Augustine of Hippo (St. Augoustinos) was the last prolific writer with any knowledge in said language, and he died in 430. And even by that time, he writes of the Punic language being "rejected" by many.
 
What would be the dominant language without Islam, you think?
The Maghrebian Romance(s)?
Berber languages - maybe something like Kabyle?
Greek?
 
African Romance anywhere west of Cyrenaica will become dominant.

This, especially along the coastlines. I suspect it would, if Vandalia survived (oh man, forgot about that :p) become a Romance language that we might call Vandalic/Vandalian. If it remains under Byzanto-Roman control, maybe it will become known later as simply the African language?

Also, Berber will be very prominent, and would certainly affect the evolution of the African Romance language(s).
 
What would be the dominant language without Islam, you think?
The Maghrebian Romance(s)?
Berber languages - maybe something like Kabyle?
Greek?

Yeah, you'd have Coptic (the modern evolution of Ancient Egyptian) in Egypt, Greek in Cyrenaica and the North African Romance language west of Cyrenaica. Berber, which would be largely contained to the interior of North Africa, wouldn't supplant the Romance language on the coastal regions or in the big cities, but it would influence it heavily, and you'd probably see some kind of trade pidgin emerge. Depending on what is going on in Byzantium/Greece, the Greek in Cyrenaica may be supplanted (Cyrenaica is not heavily populated and has little economic value and therefore easily influenced the tug and pull of global politics), most likely with Coptic, as the Cyrenians and the Egypts have a historical relationship.

But then again, it relies heavily on geopolitics, if a Berber, Greek or Coptic speaking invader (or a Spaniard neighbor, which seems likely) takes North African Romance areas, you could see a demise. Interesting to see the influence of European Romance-speaking neighbors on N. Africa.

Just my thoughts though, which could be as easily incorrect as they could be correct.
 
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Currently, prople of alMaghreb speak mainly french and arabic-with french trend, which is difficult to interpret.

Yes, but again, this is a website about alternate history - an intelectual game of What If.

What if Islam never existed or reached Maghreb-north africa, and so no Arabic language there.
 
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