Afro-Asiatic · ISO 639-3 mey
Hassaniyya Language حسانية
Hassaniyya is an Afro-Asiatic language spoken by about 3.8 million people in 6 countries. It is written in the Perso-Arabic script.
Where Hassaniyya is spoken
- Official language
- Regional official
- Spoken by 10%+
- 1–10%
- Smaller communities
Countries that speak Hassaniyya
Language family
- Afro-Asiatic
- Semitic
- West Semitic
- Central Semitic
- Arabian
- Arabic
- North African Arabic
- Western Middle Arabic
- Hassaniyya
Writing system
Perso-Arabic script
Related languages
About the Hassaniyya language
Hassaniyya (حسانية) is spoken by about 3.8 million people, which makes it the 219th most spoken language in the world — just behind Sidamo (3.8 million) and ahead of Achinese (3.7 million). It belongs to the Afro-Asiatic language family and, more precisely, to the Western Middle Arabic group within the West Semitic branch.
Where is Hassaniyya spoken?
Hassaniyya is used in 6 countries. The largest communities live in Algeria (5.2 million), Mauritania (3.8 million), Morocco (306,578), Mali (123,000) and Senegal (7,162). More than half of the population speaks it in Mauritania — the places where travellers will hear it everywhere.
Share of the population that speaks Hassaniyya: Algeria 11% (5.2 million), Mauritania 87% (3.8 million), Morocco 0.8% (306,578), Mali 0.6% (123,000), Senegal <0.1% (7,162) and Western Sahara <0.1% (1).
Hassaniyya is not a national official language anywhere. It also has regional official status in Senegal.
Writing system and status
Hassaniyya is written in the Perso-Arabic script. It is a safe, widely transmitted language: children still learn it at home as their first language.
Its closest relatives in the same branch of the family are Algerian Arabic, Moroccan Arabic, Tunisian Arabic, Maltese, Libyan Arabic, Standard Arabic and 2 more.
ISO codes: ISO 639-3 mey.
Frequently asked questions about Hassaniyya
How many people speak Hassaniyya?
Where is Hassaniyya spoken?
What language family does Hassaniyya belong to?
What is Hassaniyya called in Hassaniyya?
Is Hassaniyya an endangered language?
Data: Languages of the World dataset (MIT) — ISO 639-3, Glottolog (CC BY 4.0), Unicode CLDR, Google LinguaMeta (CC BY 4.0) and Wikidata; country lists: samayo/country-json (MIT). Speaker numbers include first- and second-language speakers where sources report them.