The origin of the Armenian language

Proto-Armenian is the earlier stage of the Armenian language which has been reconstructed by linguists.

The development of the Armenian language

Proto-Armenian
Classical Armenian (from 405)
Middle Armenian (c. 1100 – 1700)
Modern Armenian (c. 1700 – present)

History

The origin of the Proto-Armenian language is subject to scholarly debate. It is assumed that the Armenian language is an in situ development of a 3rd millennium BC Proto-Indo-European language, that arrived in the Armenian Highlands either from the Balkans or through the Caucasus, during the Bronze Age or at the latest, during the Bronze Age Collapse around 1200 BC.

One of the theories about the dawn of Armenian in the region is that Paleo-Balkan-speaking settlers related to Phrygians (the Mushki or the Armeno-Phrygians), who already had settled in the western parts of the region before the Van kingdom was established in Urartu, had become the ruling elite under the Median Empire, then by the Achaemenid Empire.

The existence of Urartian words in the Armenian language and Armenian loanwords in Urartian assumes early contact between the two languages and long periods of bilingualism.