SAINTPLUME

The Lost Languages of Diplomacy

By N.B. — Estimated reading time: 3 minutes

Diplomacy is a craft of words—whispered, written, and encoded in the languages of its time. Before English and French became the standard tongues of treaties and summits, other languages held the weight of empires and the fate of nations within their syllables. These languages, now largely lost to daily use, once charted peace and plotted war.

In the ancient Near East, Akkadian reigned as the first true diplomatic lingua franca. Emerging from Mesopotamia in the 3rd millennium BCE, it allowed kings and emissaries from Egypt, Babylon, Hatti, and beyond to correspond on equal linguistic ground. The most famous testament to this is the Egyptian–Hittite peace treaty of circa 1259 BCE, one of history’s earliest surviving international agreements, inscribed in both Akkadian cuneiform and Egyptian hieroglyphs.

Centuries later, as Rome rose and spread its dominion, Latin became the unifying language of administration, law, and diplomacy across Europe. Even after the empire's fall, Latin lingered in the courts and chanceries of medieval Europe, a vessel for legal disputes, papal bulls, and royal proclamations. Though it began to fade as vernacular languages took root, traces of Latin persist in modern diplomatic phrases and legal maxims.

By the 7th century, with the rapid expansion of the Islamic caliphates, Classical Arabic became the diplomatic and scholarly language from Al-Andalus to the Indian subcontinent. Arabic wasn’t only the tongue of theology and philosophy, but also of statecraft. Treaties, edicts, and correspondence between Muslim and Christian rulers, like those between the Abbasids and Charlemagne, were often conducted through Arabic, prized for its eloquence and precision. Even non-Arab courts, from Byzantium to India, maintained translators fluent in the language of the Qur'an and diplomacy.

Alongside it, Persian flourished, especially from the 10th to the 19th centuries, as the language of diplomacy and refined court culture across Central Asia, Iran, the Mughal Empire, and the Ottoman court. It was known for its poetic elegance, and diplomats often embedded classical verse into official correspondence to soften demands or veil threats. Persian’s influence on Ottoman Turkish and Mughal court protocol meant that major treaties and ambassadorial exchanges regularly featured Persian as either the primary or secondary diplomatic language.

By the 17th century, French had ascended as the preferred language of diplomacy in Europe. Its clarity, formality, and cultural prestige made it the ideal medium for treaties and courtly correspondence. From the salons of Versailles to the Ottoman Porte, French held sway. Even non-European powers, seeking to engage with the West on equal footing, adopted it. The Ottoman Empire, for example, conducted much of its diplomatic exchange in French by the 19th century, a testament to its status as the language of international civility and negotiation.

Perhaps the most fascinating of these lost languages is the one known simply as Lingua Franca. A Mediterranean pidgin spoken from the 11th to the 19th centuries, it was a practical blend of Italian, Arabic, Greek, Spanish, and other languages, designed for trade and diplomacy in the bustling ports of the Mediterranean. Though it was never formalized, it embodies the spirit of necessity—a testament to humanity’s instinct to find common ground, even in a tangle of tongues.

Today, these languages echo faintly in dusty manuscripts, stone inscriptions, and the occasional turn of phrase in modern treaties. They remind us that language is never just a tool; it is a reflection of power, culture, and the ceaseless evolution of human connection. In studying them, we not only uncover the mechanics of ancient diplomacy but also witness the shifting landscapes of empire, faith, and ambition. And perhaps, in Rumi’s words, we are reminded that while "silence is the language of God, all else is poor translation," it is through our ever-changing, imperfect languages that we reach for peace.

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