Omniglot - the blog

Language quiz

Simon on 25 Feb 2007

Language and Quiz questions | Comments (13)

13 Responses to “Language quiz”

1. Halabund on 25 Feb 2007 at 4:35 pm #

   For me it sounds a bit similar to the language heard here: http://www.mikmaqonline.org/stories.html (Mi’kmaq). But this probably isn’t the correct answer (I’m not a linguist).

2. Daydreamer on 25 Feb 2007 at 5:32 pm #

   @ Halabund: In Mi´kmaq there seems to be lacking, at least, the vowel [y] which is clearly identifiable in the song.
   The European sounding guitar makes me search for the language in the Old World. What about one of the Baltic languages - Latvian or Lithuanian?

3. Daydreamer on 25 Feb 2007 at 5:48 pm #

   After hearing the song a few times more I tend to believe that the language is Albanian.

4. TJ on 25 Feb 2007 at 9:49 pm #

   comhghardeas le forum! :)

5. TJ on 25 Feb 2007 at 9:52 pm #

   I have a problem listening to the mp3 ……. hmmm WMP gives me an error as if the file is unsupported!! (do you believe those guys issued even a new Windows!!!????)

6. renato on 26 Feb 2007 at 12:13 am #

   By the way, congratulations for the new Omniglot forum. Particulary I don’t like foruns. They all looks like a private closed club. I really prefer this kind of blog, where everybody, openly, can give and receive opinions. I have been learning a lot in your blog, and I really love languages, but to take part in a forum, as we say in Portuguese Não é a minha praia” or in English, This is not my beach place.

7. Minstrel Ayreon on 26 Feb 2007 at 12:23 am #

   Congrats on opening the forum! Please do check your PMs there, as I spotted something you might want to know about. If you do answer, I’d ask that you please do so in private. Thanks. :-)

8. Polly on 26 Feb 2007 at 3:02 am #

   Congratulations on the Forum! I’m awaiting an activation e-mail right now. And I still get to be Polly.

   As to the quiz - I haven’t a clue. :-(

9. Simon on 26 Feb 2007 at 12:00 pm #

   The answer is Mi’kmaq.

   Here’s a transliteration and translation of the song:

   Kloqoejk kesasultijik ne’pîti’kw
   Stars shine brightly while we sleep

   Waisisji’jk weli maliamujik
   Little animals are well cared for

   Ansale’wit jikeiwaji Mi’kma’ji’jk
   Angel watches over little Mi’kmaq

   Ke’sk Kisu’lkw jiko’teket
   While the Creator watches

   Wjit ki’l aq wjit ni’n
   For you and for me

   The file comes from:
   http://www.firstnationhelp.com/ali/kloqoejk.php

10. Halabund on 26 Feb 2007 at 5:06 pm #

    Wow! I didn’t really expect my guess to be right — I was just searching for recordings of speech in different languages on the web, and one seemed to be suspiciously similar to the language of this song …

    But I didn’t expect the answer to be a language with only 40000 speakers.

11. BG on 01 Mar 2007 at 6:56 am #

    I also thought I heard the [y], but it must have been /ə/ or /i/. There seems to be a good pronunciation guide at
    
    The Omniglot one could be updated.

12. BG on 01 Mar 2007 at 7:02 am #

    Oops I messed up the href.
    It is supposed to be:
    http://www.native-languages.org/mikmaq_guide.htm

    The Omniglot page could be updated a bit.

13. Simon on 01 Mar 2007 at 7:18 pm #

    BG - thanks for the link. I’ve updated my Mi’kmaq page now.