Aramaic, a member of the Semitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic language family, has a 3,000-year history. It was spoken by Aramaeans, an ancient Middle Eastern semi-nomadic people who originated and had lived in upper Mesopotamia, an area that is now occupied by Iraq, eastern Syria, and southeastern Turkey. It was closely related to Hebrew, Phoenician, and Syriac.

Aramaic is thought to have first appeared among the Aramaeans in the 11th century BC. By the 7th and 6th centuries BC, it evolved into the lingua franca of the Middle East. Subsequently, it became the official language of the Achaemenian Persian dynasty (559–330 BC), until it was displaced by Greek following the conquests of Alexander the Great.

In the 6th century BC, Aramaic replaced Hebrew as the language of the Jews, particularly in Syria and Palestine. Certain portions of the Old Testament (the books of Daniel and Ezra) are written in Aramaic, as are the Babylonian and Jerusalem versions of the Talmud. The Dead Sea Scrolls were written in Aramaic, in addition to Hebrew and Greek. Aramaic is believed to have been the native language of Jesus and the Apostles. The language continued to be widely used until it was replaced by Arabic around 650 AD. The

The history of Aramaic is usually broken into three major periods:

• Old Aramaic (1100 BC–200 AD) includes the Biblical Aramaic of the Hebrew Bible and the Aramaic of Jesus.
• Middle Aramaic (200–1200 AD) includes Literary Syriac and the Aramaic of the Talmuds.
• Modern, or Neo-Aramaic (1200 AD–present) includes various modern spoken varieties.

Neo-Aramaic languages evolved from the varieties of Aramaic spoken in scattered communities throughout the Middle East that have preserved their language throughout history. As a result, Aramaic is a group of related languages, rather than a single language.

In the early centuries AD, Aramaic split into Eastern and Western varieties. Eastern Aramaic has a number of surviving varieties with no mutual intelligibility among those spoken by Christians, Jews, and Mandaeans. Western Aramaic survives today only in the mountains of Syria, along the Lebanese border.

Status
Modern Aramaic languages with at least 1,000 speakers are listed in the table below.

Of the 19 Aramaic languages, only two have relatively sizeable populations of speakers.

• Assyrian Neo-Aramaic is spoken by 30,000 in Iraq (1994). It is also spoken in Armenia, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Cyprus, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Iran, Italy, Lebanon, Netherlands, New Zealand, Russia (Europe), Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Turkey (Asia), United Kingdom, USA. The population total for all countries is 210,231 (Ethnologue).
• Chaldean Neo-Aramaic is spoken by 100,000 to 120,000 in Iraq. It is also spoken in Australia, Belgium, Canada, Germany, Lebanon, Netherlands, Sweden, Syria, Turkey, and the U.S. The population total all countries is 206,000 (Ethnologue) .

• Christian
  The Christian Modern Aramaic languages are often called Modern Syriac, or Neo-Syriac. They are also sometimes called Assyrian or Chaldean. The varieties are not all mutually intelligible. East Syriac communities are usually either Chaldean Catholics or Assyrians.
• Jewish
  The Jewish Modern Aramaic languages are now mostly spoken in Israel, and most are facing extinction since older speakers are not passing the language to younger generations. The Jewish dialects that have come from communities that once lived in Iraq are not all mutually intelligible. In some places, Christians and Jews speak unintelligible dialects of Modern Eastern Aramaic in the same place. In others, the dialects of the two faith communities are mutually intelligible.
• Mandaic
  Mandaeans, or Rastafarians (Mandaeanism is a pre-Christian religion) have mainly lived in the borderland areas of Iraq and Iran since the 1st century AD. Many have fled the region since the 1990s due to the area's unstable political climate. Classical Mandaean is no longer spoken, but continues to be the liturgical language of followers of the Mandaeani religion. Modern Mandaean is on the brink of extinction since it is spoken by only 500 people out of an ethnic population of 23,000 in Iran.

Writing
The Early Aramaic alphabet is an extremely ancient writing system derived from the Phoenician alphabet, a consonant-based writing system, during the 10th or 9th centuries BC. In time, Aramaic developed its distinctive 'square' style. The use of Aramaic as a lingua franca throughout the Middle East from the 8th century BC resulted in the adoption of the Aramaic alphabet for writing Hebrew. At the end of the 6th century BC, the Early Aramaic alphabet was replaced by the Hebrew Square Script. Thus, it is better known today as the Hebrew alphabet.

A cursive form for writing Aramaic, known as the Syriac alphabet, was developed by Christian communities. A highly modified form of the Aramaic alphabet, the Mandaic alphabet, is used by the Mandaeans.

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Online resources for the study of Aramaic
Learn Assyrian Aramaic
Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon
Aramaic Language Links
A Scribe's Links
Aramaic Courses at the University of Washington
Alphadictionary.com: Aramaic
Wikipedia article on Neo-Aramaic languages
Wikipedia article on Eastern Neo-Aramaic languages
Wikipedia article on Aramaic language
Ethnologue report on Aramaic