Hittite language

Hittite (natively nešili "[in the language] of Neša"), also known as Nesite and Neshite, is the extinct language once spoken by the Hittites, an Indo-European-speaking people who created an empire centred on Hattusa in north-central Anatolia (modern-day Turkey). The language is attested in cuneiform, in records dating from the 16th (Anitta text) to the 13th century BC, with isolated Hittite loanwords and numerous personal names appearing in an Old Assyrian context from as early as the 20th century BC.

By the Late Bronze Age, Hittite had started losing ground to its close relative Luwian. It appears that in the 13th century BC, Luwian was the most widely spoken language in the Hittite capital of Hattusa. After the collapse of the Hittite Empire as a part of the more general Late Bronze Age collapse, Luwian emerged in the Early Iron Age as the main language of the so-called Syro-Hittite states in southwestern Anatolia and northern Syria.

Hittite is the earliest-attested of the Indo-European languages and is the best-known of the Anatolian languages.

Hittite is the modern name for the language, chosen after the identification of the Hatti (Khatti) kingdom with the Hittites mentioned in the Bible (Hebrew Kheti), although this identification was subsequently challenged. The terms Hattian or Hattic, by contrast, are used to refer to the indigenous people who preceded them, and their non Indo-European Hattic language.