Language is power, life and the instrument of culture, the instrument of domination and liberation. – Angela Carter.
Language is a complex part of our lives which continually transforms through ages. Languages are part and parcel of our everyday life and primary keys of communication. There are lots of interesting facts about language you might not know, let us get to know a few of them.
- There are around 2,700 languages with more than 7,000 dialects spoken in the world. The most widely spoken languages in the world are Chinese, Spanish, English, and Hindi.
- There are 50,000+ characters in Chinese, the most spoken language in the world. You should be able to read at least 2,000 of these to read a newspaper.
- Every two weeks, a dialect or a language reaches on the verge of dying. There are over 231 languages that are extinct, and around 2,400 of world’s languages are approaching to become extinct.
- Do you know the name of the most translated book in the world? It is Bible which has been translated into 2,454 different languages. The Little Prince, originally written in French comes second with translations in 253 languages. Interestingly, the most translated author in the world is Agatha Christie.
- The language with the largest alphabet belongs to Cambodian language Khmer which is 74 characters long. However, the language with the largest number of words is perhaps Arabic with varied perceptions on the number of words.
- There are 300 languages spoken in the United States. The country credited with the highest number of official language is South Africa. In the United States, 56% of Spanish speakers can speak English very well.
- Though the origin of language is one of the most debated topics, most linguists agree that it started when modern humans evolved in Africa, around 100,00 BC.
- The oldest known languages of the world are Sanskrit, Sumerian, Hebrew, and Basque. We know this fact because of the written records of these languages. Therefore, there is no specific answer for the oldest speech because we would never get to know about the oral traditions.
Conclusion – Being a well-versed language translation agency, we are aware of many such interesting facts about language. Be it legal document translation services or certified language translation, our expert translators are efficient in performing impeccable translation of any docment in more than 30+ languages. Need any assistance in translation. Call us at – 888-670-3369.