Skip to main content

Infographic: 50+ Fascinating Language Facts You Didn’t Know

Are you looking for interesting language facts? You’ve come to the right place!

The following infographic details over 50 interesting facts about various languages.

Here are six that aren’t in the infographic:

  1. The last character in the alphabet used to be "and". Reciting the alphabet used to end with "and, per se, and".  This was later corrupted into the term "ampersand" and the logogram we know today.
  2. The facing pages of an open book have names: verso and recto. In English and other languages read left-to-right, Recto is on the right, but the opposite is true in languages read right-to-left.
  3. The words "male" and "female" do not share a root, and in fact derive from two different words in Old French.
  4. The "y" in names like "Ye Olde Soda Shoppe" is actually supposed to represent a "th" sound. The "y" character is used as a substitute for the old English character thorn,  þ.
  5. English has this quirk where consonants sometimes jump from an indefinite article to a noun. It’s called misdivision. One example of this is nickname, which derives from (an) eke name. The character "n" jumped from the article to the noun as the word.
  6. A pangram is a sentence that contains every letter in the language. For example, "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.

via takelessons

Similar Articles


Comments


Guest from Germany January 28, 2020 um 3:01 am

The first printed book (in the western world) was indeed printed in Germany, but it was written in Latin (Gutenberg bible).


New Infographic: 50+ Fascinating Language Facts You Didn’t Know – Stephen's Lighthouse February 15, 2020 um 7:50 am

[…] Infographic: 50+ Fascinating Language Facts You Didn’t Know […]


Write a Comment