Languages of the World

The Ultimate Ancestor: How Linguists Reconstructed the Proto-Indo-European Language

Imagine a language that vanished over 5,000 years ago, leaving behind no written records. This is Proto-Indo-European (PIE), the mysterious…

1 month ago

Canali on Mars: The 19th-Century Mistranslation That Invented a World

This post explores how Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli's 1877 description of "canali" (channels) on Mars was translated into English as…

1 month ago

The Surgeon and the Lexicographer: The Unlikely Genius Who Built the OED From an Asylum

The creation of the Oxford English Dictionary relied on thousands of volunteers, but none were as brilliant or enigmatic as…

1 month ago

Reading the Knots: Quipu, the Inca’s Mysterious 3D Writing System

What if writing wasn't flat on a page, but a three-dimensional web of information you could hold in your hands?…

1 month ago

Punctuation Reimagined: Hervé Bazin’s Linguistic Innovations

Hervé Bazin (1911-1996), a famous French writer and essayist, is known not only for his literary contributions but also for…

2 years ago

Where is Esperanto Spoken?

Esperanto, the most successful constructed international auxiliary language, was invented in the late 19th century by L. L. Zamenhof with…

2 years ago

The Mystery of Rongorongo: Easter Island’s Enigmatic Script

Rongorongo, the written script of the native Rapanui people of Easter Island, stands as one of the most intriguing and…

2 years ago

Speaking with Angels: The Enochian Language

In the diverse world of linguistics, few tales are as captivating and mysterious as the story of Enochian, reputedly the…

2 years ago

Famous Mistranslations: The “Let Them Eat Cake” of the East

Just as the West has its infamous mistranslation of Marie Antoinette's "Let them eat cake", the East too has seen…

2 years ago

Famous Mistranslations: “Let Them Eat Cake!”

The phrase "Let them eat cake" is one of the most notorious remarks attributed to a historical figure. This sentence…

2 years ago

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