For some decades now, scholars have been aware that Classic Maya hieroglyphs most likely recorded a language belonging to the Ch’olan-Tzeltalan branch of the Mayan language family. More recently, Houston et al (2000) proposed that most texts were in fact written in a language from the Eastern Ch’olan branch, most closely related to modern Ch’orti’ and the now-extinct Ch’olti’ (partially recorded in the 17th century). Their model has been debated and tested for the past quarter-century, and we are now in a position to revisit the precise identification of the prestigious, conservative language of hieroglyphic texts written for several centuries across the Maya lowlands. Using several lengthy and well-documented Late Classic texts, this paper will show that while there can no longer be any doubt that these were written in a language most similar to Ch’orti’—and, secondarily, to the historically-attested Ch’olti’—the Classic Mayan language nonetheless attests numerous innovations which are not shared with either of its two closest relatives. In other words, it must be identified as a distinct Eastern Ch’olan language in its own right: a language which developed from a shared common ancestor with Ch’orti’ and Ch’olti’, but which nonetheless diverged from them. Further, according to the best evidence now available to us, this language eventually passed out of existence during the tumultuous years of the Terminal Classic period collapse of Southern Lowland Maya Civilization in the ninth century.