It is not often that we can observe language change in a language over a period of more than
one thousand years. Nobiin-Nubian is the only language of the Nilo-Saharan phylum amongst
African languages where this is possible. This book analyzes processes of language change and
grammaticalization in this language based on textual evidence from Old Nobiin written between
the 8th and the 15th century as well as from Modern Nobiin. At the same time the study of the
non-religious texts in Old Nobiin gives new insights into history culture and society of
Medieval Nubia. As so far most of the work on Old Nobiin has been done by classical scholars
and the texts are available only in non-transcribed and non-segmented form the numerous
examples from the texts may serve to interest scholars with different backgrounds for the
interesting subject of language change in Nobiin as well as the medieval history of Nubia.
