Cushitic

The Cushitic languages are a branch of Afroasiatic spoken chiefly in the Horn of Africa, from the Red Sea Hills of Sudan to the Tanzanian Rift Valley. The Blemmyes of Lower Nubia appear in Egyptian records from the sixth century BCE and spoke an early form of Beja.

South Cushitic cattle herders carried the Savanna Pastoral Neolithic culture into the Rift Valley in migrations from the Horn lasting until about 700 CE. In the Ethiopian highlands the Agaw founded the Zagwe dynasty, which ruled from roughly 1137 to 1270 and under King Lalibela built the rock-hewn churches of the town named after him.

Most Cushitic tongues long remained spoken vernaculars, while written culture in the region was carried by Ge'ez in the Christian highlands and by Arabic in Muslim lands.