just a quick note while i’m preparing the first deity posts: Messapic is the name scholars have given to the language spoken across Iapygia. this is a bit confusing, because Messapia (the place) only refers to the southern chunk of Iapygia, but Messapic (the language) was spoken in all of Iapygia.
why? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ maybe because these ethnonyms aren’t always consistent anyway, or because Messapia is where most of the Messapic inscriptions are found. probably both
anyway. Messapic is the language of most of the inscriptions we’re gonna see. it pretty much only survives in fragments—no literature, no long-form anything—so a lot of the linguistic analysis of it is pretty speculative. but i find the bits we do know kinda…. charming? i just like the sounds of it.
here’s a link with a few fragments of Messapic writing; we’ll be seeing more inscriptions like these very soon.