The Central Semitic languages are a proposed intermediate group of Semitic languages, comprising the Late Iron Age, modern dialect of Arabic (prior to which Arabic was a Southern Semitic language), and older Bronze Age Northwest Semitic languages (which include Aramaic, Ugaritic, and the Canaanite languages of Hebrew and Phoenician). In this reckoning Central Semitic itself is one of three divisions of Semitic along with East Semitic (Akkadian) and South Semitic (South Arabian, and the Semitic languages of Ethiopia).