Geez (Old Ethiopic)

Abstract This chapter introduces Old Ethiopic, which is also known as Geez. Geez was a spoken and a literary language amidst the Aksumite period and continued as the religious language of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church until the present time and the literary language of Christian Ethiopia until the 19th century. The chapter lists the phonological changes that took place in the Aksumite period in the consonant and vowel systems of Geez, the main phonological alternations, the basic facts on morphology, syntax, and pragmatics.