The Eastern and Southern Nilotic languages were formerly widely believed to constitute a single Paranilotic (or, earlier, “Nilo-Hamitic”) grouping; they were believed to have arisen as a sort of “mixed language” combining Nilotic (modern Western Nilotic) and “Hamitic” (in particular, modern Cushitic) elements. However, ever since Joseph Greenberg’s reclassification of African languages, they have been considered to be two out of the three independent branches of Nilotic.