The book is another volume of the multi-volume encyclopedic publication "Languages ​ ​ of the World," which is being created at the Institute of Linguistics of the Russian Academy of Sciences. This volume is devoted to the ancient relict languages ​ ​ of Western Asia that are not part of the Indo-European and Semitic language families, namely Sumerian, Elamite, Hurrian, Urartian, Hattian and Kassite, as well as chronologically and territorially close to them the Harappan language of the Indus Valley.