Do you know or can you guess the language, and do you know where it’s spoken?
14 thoughts on “Language Quiz”
Sub-Saharan African, possibly Bantu, I’d say. I also think I heard the names of Jesus and Mary …
I must agree with Emanuel. It is possibly Bantu. I also THOUGHT I heard the word “la terra” which makes me wonder if there is some sort of Spanish borrowing but of course there would already be a word in whatever the language it is for “the earth”. That’s what is always so intriguing and fun about these quizzes.
If he did say “la tierra” then maybe it’s a language from Equatorial Guinea? There are Spanish and Portuguese based creoles in Equatorial Guinea too
I did a bit of searching and wonder if it isn’t Kimbundu. Just a guess.
The language in the recording doesn’t seem to feature /ʒ/ but Kimbundu, I think, does.
I’m going to go a bit contrarian, and say from somewhere in Africa, but not Bantu. The little I know of Swahili makes me think I should here more accord between words than I do in that clip.
Good point! Maybe it\\\’s a Bantoid language with less such pronounced noun class features and therefore less word-initial accord.
I think it is Lambya.
Yes, a Bantu language, added to Omniglot today.
The language is Lambya (Ichilambya), a Bantu language spoken in Tanzania and Malawi.
To be honest, I wouldn’t have had any idea of the answer had Simon not put Lambya on and I just happened to notice. No claim here to intelligence here, just luck! Lol
Sub-Saharan African, possibly Bantu, I’d say. I also think I heard the names of Jesus and Mary …
I must agree with Emanuel. It is possibly Bantu. I also THOUGHT I heard the word “la terra” which makes me wonder if there is some sort of Spanish borrowing but of course there would already be a word in whatever the language it is for “the earth”. That’s what is always so intriguing and fun about these quizzes.
If he did say “la tierra” then maybe it’s a language from Equatorial Guinea? There are Spanish and Portuguese based creoles in Equatorial Guinea too
I did a bit of searching and wonder if it isn’t Kimbundu. Just a guess.
The language in the recording doesn’t seem to feature /ʒ/ but Kimbundu, I think, does.
I’m going to go a bit contrarian, and say from somewhere in Africa, but not Bantu. The little I know of Swahili makes me think I should here more accord between words than I do in that clip.
Good point! Maybe it\\\’s a Bantoid language with less such pronounced noun class features and therefore less word-initial accord.
I think it is Lambya.
Yes, a Bantu language, added to Omniglot today.
The language is Lambya (Ichilambya), a Bantu language spoken in Tanzania and Malawi.
The recording comes from YouTube
To be honest, I wouldn’t have had any idea of the answer had Simon not put Lambya on and I just happened to notice. No claim here to intelligence here, just luck! Lol
Same here, Hank!
I also think it is Lambya
I did a bit of searching and wonder if it isn’t Kimbundu Just a guess.