Extinct Languages of the World Quiz

Answer: North America

The language of the Atakapa Indians of southern Louisiana does not appear to be related to any other indigenous language of the area. The last native speakers of this North American language passed away in the early part of the 20th century and it is doubtful that the language could ever be revived. Less than 50 actual words of the language have been recorded.

Answer: U.S. Virgin Islands

Negerhollands was an unusual mix of Dutch, English, French, Spanish, Danish, and African. It can be best described as a Dutch creole language. It was spoken for many years on the island group that is known today as the U.S. Virgin Islands. Once English was introduced to the islands, the use of Negerhollands began to decline. The last native speaker of the language died in 1987.

Answer: Newfoundland

'Beothuk' is Beothukan for 'people', and that is one of the few words that is still known today of that culture's language. Only about 400 words (written down) were recorded from the 19th century. There is some discussion that the language was linked to Algonquin, but the general consensus is that the language was isolated, due to the isolation of their island existence.

Answer: Dalmatian

The Dalmatian language is one of the extinct Romance languages. Once it was spoken in the region known as the Republic of Ragusa or Republic of Dubrovnik. This republic had the city of Dubrovnik and ceased to exist in 1808. It formed part of the region of Dalmatia, a much larger region which holds most of the southern part of present day Croatia.

Answer: Iberian

This unique language may have links to the Basque language but evidence to this link is lacking. Spoken by an eclectic group of people that lived along the Mediterranean coast of the Iberian Peninsula, the language has been only partially deciphered. Most evidence for this language has been found on pottery and ceramics which has made translation of this extinct language even more difficult.

The other three options are extinct languages from the continent of Africa.

Answer: Gaulish

The Gauls inhabited the region encompassed within the boundaries mentioned in the question from the Iron Age. They were completely conquered by the Romans by the mid-1st century, and were subsequently amalgamated into the Roman culture. By the time that the region was conquered by the Franks in 486, the Gaulish language was well in decline. It is believed that the language ceased to exist sometime in the 6th century.

Answer: Susquehannock

The Susquehannock language was spoken by the tribe of the same name, living in the area around the Susquehanna River. This contains areas in the American states of New York, Pennsylvania and Maryland. The language became extinct around 1763. There is little left of the language. Swedish missionary Johannes Campanius wrote the book "Vocabula Mahakuassica" in 1640, which contains the basics of the language.

Answer: False

This is completely false. The proper name of native language for this island is Rapa Nui. With approximately 800 speakers, Rapa Nui is what is known as an endangered language not an extinct language. It contains only ten consonants and five vowels and is not known to be related to any other Oceanic language.

The name Rapa Nui is also used to denote the island, the culture, and the people themselves. Today most of the islands inhabitants speak a form of Spanish.

Answer: True

This is true. Sumerian was spoken in ancient Mesopotamia as early as the 4th millennium B.C. Around the second millennium B.C. Akadian replaced Sumerian as the spoken language and Sumerian became the language used for all religious, legal, ceremonial, and scientific purposes. It was not deciphered until the 19th century after many years of studying ancient cuneiform tablets.

Answer: Ancient Egyptian

Coptic, the spoken language descendant from Ancient Egyptian, died out with the conquest of Egypt by the Muslims; it was gradually replaced with Arabic. As a written language, Demotic and Coptic evolved from the Ancient Egyptian system of hieroglyphics to include alphabetics, and later even indicated vowels.