Can you identify the language, and do you know where it’s spoken?
14 thoughts on “Language Quiz”
Wow. In the first sentence I thought I heard the word ‘chort’ = Slavic ‘devil’, then the rhythm reminded me of some Scandinavian languages, and by the end I was sure I was hearing Persian vowels. All I can say is that I’m pretty sure it’s not Chinese
I have similar feelings as Jonathan, although with different languages. At first I thought it was a dialect of Estonian, but then I started hearing some Hungarian case endings. But still I’m not even sure if it’s a Uralic language after all. It had some parts that sounded very unfamiliar.
All I can think of is Akrikaans for some reason.
This sounds to me like an Uralic language, Finnic, as if it were Estonian or Voro, but I’m not completely sure. I thought I heard some Norwegian word … maybe by proximity?
It certainly has sounds that seem to be Finnish or Estonian (or even Hungarian). Could it be one of the Sami languages? I thought I heard the word “Sami” at least twice. As well I heard “viis” which I think is Estonian for “five”. If you look at the number systems here for the Sami languages, they sound similar. All this is what makes these language quizzes so much fun on Omniglot!
I’m gonna say something Finnic or some Sami language, given that the word “sami” or something is mentioned in the recording as well. Based on vowels and prosody as well, I’m pretty sure it’s from somewhere in Fenno-Scandia.
This is definitely not a centum Indo-European language and probably not a satem one, either.
It reminds me of Hungarian but it could be another one of the Finno-Ugric languages like Finnish or Estonian.
I guessed Hungarian without listening to anything but now having done so, Hungarian has a ton of “sh” sounds and Estonian doesn’t have those Swedish-sounding diphthongs (or as many of them).
After listening to Northern and Southern Saami, my best guess is Southern Saami.
To me it sounds very much like Hungarian. Maybe a Hungarian dialect of some kind. Or else, but less probably, one of the other Ugric languages.
Some sounds I’ve only heard in Swedish and Turkish but don’t think it’s other. Mind I thought I heard Lördag and Sondag!
My initial thoughts were northern european. the first couple of sentences sound Finnish. However, i feel like i know what Finnish sounds like so i thought maybe Estonian but then the second half starts to sound more slavic. I’ve seen a few people mention sami which has a decent shot i guess but i’m thinking somewhere else. A little further south? Possibly a mash up dialect from somewhere in area?!
I think that if I heard any Norwegian word maybe it’s Lule Sami, Torne Sami or Finnic Sami, which are spoken in Norway if it were Sami and not Finnic.
The answer is Mansi (Маньси), an Ob-Ugric language spoken in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug of the Russian Federation.
The recording comes from YouTube:
If you listen to the video on Youtube, you can hear 3 parts : in the first one, he is speaking Mansi (Kondai dialect), but he himself says in the comment that he doesn’t master the language ; in the second part (from 0:50), he is speaking Hungarian, and in the third one (from 2:05), he is speaking Russian. The man is Russian, but his Hungarian is quite good, and many Hungarians in the comments pay him compliments on the way he speaks their language. I cannot judge about his Mansi accent, as I don’t speak this language, but I suspect he has a strong Hungarian accent in Mansi, , hence my first impression on the language. Else, someone in the comments says that Mansi is what is closest to Hungarian, even if they have zero percent mutual intelligibility. Let me add that unfortunately, the language is endangered, as are many languages of the former Soviet Union having switched to Russian. I think it’s a pity that all those languages disappear!
Wow. In the first sentence I thought I heard the word ‘chort’ = Slavic ‘devil’, then the rhythm reminded me of some Scandinavian languages, and by the end I was sure I was hearing Persian vowels. All I can say is that I’m pretty sure it’s not Chinese
I have similar feelings as Jonathan, although with different languages. At first I thought it was a dialect of Estonian, but then I started hearing some Hungarian case endings. But still I’m not even sure if it’s a Uralic language after all. It had some parts that sounded very unfamiliar.
All I can think of is Akrikaans for some reason.
This sounds to me like an Uralic language, Finnic, as if it were Estonian or Voro, but I’m not completely sure. I thought I heard some Norwegian word … maybe by proximity?
It certainly has sounds that seem to be Finnish or Estonian (or even Hungarian). Could it be one of the Sami languages? I thought I heard the word “Sami” at least twice. As well I heard “viis” which I think is Estonian for “five”. If you look at the number systems here for the Sami languages, they sound similar. All this is what makes these language quizzes so much fun on Omniglot!
I’m gonna say something Finnic or some Sami language, given that the word “sami” or something is mentioned in the recording as well. Based on vowels and prosody as well, I’m pretty sure it’s from somewhere in Fenno-Scandia.
This is definitely not a centum Indo-European language and probably not a satem one, either.
It reminds me of Hungarian but it could be another one of the Finno-Ugric languages like Finnish or Estonian.
I guessed Hungarian without listening to anything but now having done so, Hungarian has a ton of “sh” sounds and Estonian doesn’t have those Swedish-sounding diphthongs (or as many of them).
After listening to Northern and Southern Saami, my best guess is Southern Saami.
To me it sounds very much like Hungarian. Maybe a Hungarian dialect of some kind. Or else, but less probably, one of the other Ugric languages.
Some sounds I’ve only heard in Swedish and Turkish but don’t think it’s other. Mind I thought I heard Lördag and Sondag!
My initial thoughts were northern european. the first couple of sentences sound Finnish. However, i feel like i know what Finnish sounds like so i thought maybe Estonian but then the second half starts to sound more slavic. I’ve seen a few people mention sami which has a decent shot i guess but i’m thinking somewhere else. A little further south? Possibly a mash up dialect from somewhere in area?!
I think that if I heard any Norwegian word maybe it’s Lule Sami, Torne Sami or Finnic Sami, which are spoken in Norway if it were Sami and not Finnic.
The answer is Mansi (Маньси), an Ob-Ugric language spoken in the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug of the Russian Federation.
The recording comes from YouTube:
If you listen to the video on Youtube, you can hear 3 parts : in the first one, he is speaking Mansi (Kondai dialect), but he himself says in the comment that he doesn’t master the language ; in the second part (from 0:50), he is speaking Hungarian, and in the third one (from 2:05), he is speaking Russian. The man is Russian, but his Hungarian is quite good, and many Hungarians in the comments pay him compliments on the way he speaks their language. I cannot judge about his Mansi accent, as I don’t speak this language, but I suspect he has a strong Hungarian accent in Mansi, , hence my first impression on the language. Else, someone in the comments says that Mansi is what is closest to Hungarian, even if they have zero percent mutual intelligibility. Let me add that unfortunately, the language is endangered, as are many languages of the former Soviet Union having switched to Russian. I think it’s a pity that all those languages disappear!