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Here’s the latest news from the world of Omniglot.

New language pages:

• Bambalang (Chrambo), a Grassfields Southern Bantoid language spoken in Cameroon.
• Bila (kiBila), a Bantu language spoken in Ituri Province in the northeast of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
• Budu (Ɨbʉdhʉ), a Bantu language spoken in Orientale Province in the northeast of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

New numbers pages:

• Zotung (Zo), a Kuki-Chin language spoken mainly in Chin State in western Myanmar.
• Yine, a Southern Arawakan language spoken mainly in eastern and southern Peru.

New constructed script: Ilo Reverse Abugida, an alternative writing system for Hawaiian invented by TheDankBoi69 and based on the Maldivian Thaana script.

New adapted script: Sawi Toki Pona, a way to write Toki Pona with the Shavian script devised by Aahan Kotian.

New article: Decoding Meanings in Spanish Color Expressions

On the Omniglot blog we find out when a tomato is not a tomato in a post entitled Foreign Eggplants, and there’s also the usual Language Quiz. See if you can guess what language this is:

Here’s a clue: this language is spoken in northern Queenland in Australia.

The mystery language in last week’s language quiz was: Musey (Museyna), a Chadic language spoken in southern Chad.

In this week’s Adventure in Etymology, Luxurious Locks, we unlock connections between the words luxury and lock.

It’s also available on Instagram and TikTok.

On the Celtiadur blog there’s a new post entitled Captive Hostages about words for hostage, captive, pledge and related things in Celtic languages, and I made improvements to the Soft and Tender post.

In other news, I went to see Babymetal at the O2 Arena in London this week. It was a fantastic show that I thoroughly enjoyed. Their songs are almost all in Japanese and I’ve heard most of them many times, so I can sort of sing along, and while I can understand Japanese to some extent, and have everyday conversations, understanding songs is on a different level. I might understand some words and phrases, but the overall meaning usually escapes me.

At the concert, and on my way to and from it, I heard people speaking a variety of languages. The ones I recognised included Spanish, German, Dutch, Czech, Russian, Arabic and Welsh.

For more Omniglot News, see:
https://www.omniglot.com/news/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/omniglot/
https://www.facebook.com/Omniglot-100430558332117

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