SUDANIC LANGUAGES

African languages spoken from Ethiopia in the east to Nigeria in the west. Totally unrelated languages were included in the various groupings classified by some early scholars as Sudanic, usually on the basis of geographic or other nonlinguistic grounds. Languages classified as Sudanic include all that are now classified as Nilo-Saharan (as well as a few classified as Afro-Asiatic [formerly Hamito-Semitic] and Niger-Congo). See also Chari-Nile languages.