Punic language

Punic
Punic
Phoenicio-Punic, Carthaginian
	One of the Tripolitania Punic inscriptions, in both Latin (top) and Punic (bottom) script.
Region	Tunisia, coastal parts of Algeria, Morocco, southern Iberia, Balearic islands, Libya, Malta, western Sicily, southern and eastern Sardinia
Era	8th century BC to 6th century AD
Language family	Afro-Asiatic Semitic West Semitic Central Semitic Northwest Semitic Canaanite Phoenician Punic; ; ; ; ; ; ;
Early form	Phoenician
Writing system	Phoenician alphabet
Language codes
ISO 639-3	xpu
Linguist List	xpu
Glottolog	puni1241; neop1239 Neo-Punic

The Punic language, also called Phoenicio-Punic or Carthaginian, is an extinct variety of the Phoenician language, a Canaanite language of the Northwest Semitic branch of the Semitic languages. An offshoot of the Phoenician language of coastal West Asia (modern Lebanon and north western Syria), it was principally spoken on the Mediterranean coast of Northwest Africa, the Iberian peninsula and several Mediterranean islands, such as Malta, Sicily, and Sardinia by the Punic people, or western Phoenicians, throughout classical antiquity, from the 8th century BC to the 6th century AD.

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