Some two thousand inscriptions are known and written in the Ancient South Arabian Monumental Script, known as Musnad.

Qatabanian inscriptions increase after the beginning of the 4th century BC when the Sabaeans ceased to dominate the area, and Qatabān became an independent kingdom.

Qatabanian was spoken in an area across the kingdom of Qatabān as far as Jabal al-'Awd (near Zafar) in the southwest, and if we are to believe the Greek and Latin writers, it went as far as Bāb al-Mandab on the Red Sea.

[2] The language used to write inscriptions in the kingdom of Awsān, known as Awsānian (or Awsānite), is virtually identical to Qatabānic, but it is so poorly attested (25 inscriptions) that it remains uncertain whether it is a Qatabānic dialect or a distinct language.

Qatabānian expresses distributives by repeating the number, thus: b-ˤs2r ˤs2r ḫbṣtm mṣˤm l-ṭt ṭt ywmm "ten full Ḫabṣat coins each for each day".