1. History and Arabization

Before the Arab invasion in the 7th century C.E., Libyans, Jews, Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans, Vandals, and Byzantines peopled those countries which make up today's Libya. The Libyans were ancestors of the Berbers and spoke Libyan, from which derived the rest of the Berber dialects. Libyco-Berber (along with Egyptian, Couchitic, Chadian, and Semitic) is one of the five branches of the Hamito-Sem…