Greek (Ελληνικά, IPA: [eliniˈka] — "Hellenic") has a documented history of 3,500 years, the longest
of any single language within the Indo-European family. It is also one of the earliest attested Indo-
European languages, with fragmentary records in Mycenaean dating back to the 15th or 14th
century BC, matched only by the Anatolian languages and Vedic Sanskrit. Today, it is spoken by
approximately 12–15 million people in Greece, Cyprus, Australia, Albania, Bulgaria, the Former
Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Italy, Turkey, Armenia, Georgia, Ukraine, Moldavia, Romania,
Egypt and emigrant communities around the world.

Greek has been written in the Greek alphabet (the first to introduce vowels) since the 9th century
BC in Greece (before that in Linear B), and the 4th century BC in Cyprus (before that in Cypriot
syllabary). Greek literature has a continuous history of nearly three thousand years.