Mandaic language

language of the Mandaean religion and community

alphabet used for writing the Mandaic language

Unicode block (U+0840-085F)

Neo-Mandaic, also known as Modern Mandaic, sometimes called the "ratna" ( "jargon"), is the modern reflex of the Mandaic language, the liturgical language of the Mandaean religious community of Iraq and Iran. Although severely endangered, it survives as the first language of a small number of Mandaeans (possibly as few as 100–200 speakers) in Iran and in the Mandaean diaspora. All Neo-Mandaic speakers are multilingual in the languages of their neighbors, Arabic and Persian, and the influence of these languages upon the grammar of Neo-Mandaic is considerable, particularly in the lexicon a