Ligurian Language | Can Spanish, Galician and Catalan speakers understand it?

In this episode of the Romance languages Mutual intelligibility show we feature the Ligurian language or Genoese as it's called by some. We're going to see if Catalan, Galician and Spanish speakers can understand this endangered language spoken in Northern Italy, Corsica, Sardinia and parts of the Mediterranean coastal zone of France. The participants of this language challange have to guess the words described to them in Ligurian and they can communicate with each other using only their native languages. In my show I try to represent minority languages as much as I can so check out the other videos on my channel if you want to see more.
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🤗 Big thanks to:
Francesco - from Liguria, painter: IG: @francesco_canepa_arte
Yago - from Galicia, IG: @yagopem
Jose - from Venezuela, IG: @spanishconjose
Guillem from Catalonia
🕰 Time Stamps:
0:00 -Introduction
2:00 - 1. word
6:20 - 2. word
9:23 - 3. word
12:48 - 4. word
16:59 - 5. word
23:09 - Commentary in English
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🤗 Big hug to everyone reading my video descriptions! You rock! 🤓💪🏻
#genoa

[@francescocanepa1007]

thank you very much Norbert! it has been a great pleasure, and thanks also to the other participants. I particularly wanted to thank "l’anonimo zeneise" for writing me the subtitles! he is really a very kind person!

[@marikaserasini2315]

Hey, greetings from Savona😍😍👋👋!!

[@miticogabry68]

Fortissimo sentire parlare la variante del tuo genovese e gli altri che infine ti capivano. Da un tigullino. 😉

[@iammatheus]

Hi, could you suggest singers who sing in Ligurian? Or songs in that language

[@francescocanepa1007]

Grazie, un saluto a tutti! Matheus, here in italy we consider the album in genoese language “creuza de ma” of Fabrizio de André a national masterpiece of folk/author’s music! Thank u for asking

[@miticogabry68]

@@iammatheus I propose to you not only "Creuza de mä" by Fabrizio De Andrè, but also the beautiful songs in ligurian language by Buby Senarega from Camogli, like "Mae nonno o l'Angeo" (My grandfather Angelo), "U barban -Ai pè do vegio convento-" (The Barban, in front of an old convent), the beautiful "L'ochin" (The seagull), "Ciammime un po' unn-a mattin" (Try to call me one morning), all present here on You Tube... 😉

[@cristinadelgrosso9826]

It is beautiful to see a young person speaking Genovese.

[@Flavio06626]

Semo restæ inta pòchi

[@steapessanhu]

@@Flavio06626 No l'é vêo semmu tànti

[@Lorenzo_Donzelli]

Già

[@darkkestrel1]

I love how this channel gives a voice to regional/minority languages in a really fun way :) keep up the good work!

[@ricefields9121]

Arpitan?

[@commentquerty3092]

The Catalan speaker ( Guillen) is the savior here! his clear questions about all the words gave all the hints to guess what the guy was asking for. Thumbs up for that young man!

[@poti9115]

And besides that, he said really cult catalan words that really few people use as Metzina, Esquella or Plegamans

[@massimopanza8582]

The Catalan noun "sorra" goes back to Latin "saburra".This "saburra" is not common, but still attested in Italian with the meaning of "sand", and, in its turn, ultimately shares the same root with both "sabbia" [sand] < "sabula" and "zavorra" [ballast] - so called due to the fact that sand was used as ballast. In other words: even in this apparently outlandish case, Catalan shows itself as the Neo-Latin language it is: a brother among brothers (cf., also, French sable/sablon, Occitan sabla, Spanish sablón).

[@clementeperez2870]

Very good post! 👍

[@lmgc5059]

En castellano existe la palabra zahorra

[@APorto-by8ys]

And even Galician "xabre".

[@eefaaf]

It reminded me of the verse in a song by Lluis Llach (Madame): 'Turista a la planxa, amb oli, sorra i sal'

[@juandiegovalverde1982]

in Spanish "zorra" means vixen.

[@Caine61]

I love how this channel sheds light on languages / dialects that I never knew existed. So interesting! I learned Spanish in 2021 and I'm learning Italian at the moment and I was pleased with how much I could understand these guys.

[@jonarthritiskwanhc]

Romanian: 1. Lămâie, țitroană (regionalism) 2. Nisip (from Bulgarian), arină (regionalism) (from Latin) 3. Venin (venom) (from Latin), otravă (poison) (from Old Church Slavonic) 4. Balangă (cowbell) (from 'balang', which is an onomatopoeia) 5. Călugăriță (from 'călugăr' (monk) (from Greek) and -iță (feminine suffix) All the Latin terms here are inherited from Latin, not borrowed from other Romance languages

[@danymann95]

Există un cuvânt regional pentru lămâie: țitroană

[@tolkiendil4806]

Thank you!

[@Unbrutal_Rawr]

_țitroană_ is a borrowing, an internationalism that also exists in every European language, and is not inherited from Latin.

[@fan8281xx]

The "bell" round the collar/neck of beasts in Spanish is CENCERRO

[@georgemcbride7857]

@@fan8281xxI like Balang better.

[@fenghualiu2653]

I like how consonants between vowels just randomly disappear and trigger compensatory lengthening 😂

[@juandiegovalverde1982]

I think that the disappearing consonants are r and l.

[@juandiegovalverde1982]

in Portuguese and Galician the disappearing consonants are l and n.

[@fenghualiu2653]

@@juandiegovalverde1982 yah i mean who elides r thats so strange 😂

[@tcbbctagain572]

@@juandiegovalverde1982 only in brazilian portuguese

[@tcbbctagain572]

@@fenghualiu2653 that's just in Brazil

[@JNeto-ys5xq]

Hablo español, portugués, inglés, francés y entiendo bastante del gallego, catalán e italiano, pero cuando escuché el idioma Ligur me sonó muchísimo al portugués de Brasil, tanto que para la primera palabra me dejé de concentrar en la palabra que intentaban adivinar por encontrar las diferencias con la sonoridad y la acentuación típica de Brasil. 🤯

[@alessiocrovetto9609]

Genova en su historia tubo mucha influencia de partes de portugal, por eso se parece tanto el idioma!;)

[@michaelcannon7640]

I thought the same. The rhythm of speaking resembles Brazilian Portuguese.

[@jecko980]

Genoese merchants ifluenced a lot portoguese accent in the past

[@zepereira9435]

Ligurian sounds very similar to the accent from the city of São Paulo, particularly from neighbourhoods with strong Italian influence. Although São Paulo is the most Italian city in Brazil, as far as I know not many people from Liguria emigrated to the city, but somehow the accents sound very similar.

[@marcobertoni2381]

​@@alessiocrovetto9609ma dove😂 che sono dall altra parte della penisola iberica 😂😂😂 ! Abelinou

[@Jgab602]

What I find interesting is that there're some interesting similarities in the vowels and consonants of Portuguese and Ligurian, like the o beeing u and the ñ that's pronounced the same as the Portuguese nh, also the nasalization of vowels before n.

[@peterfireflylund]

Yes! It reminded me of a Portuguese version of Italian, if that makes sense.

[@Mirabai_]

Genoese has the french u somewhere

[@joseignacio512]

@@peterfireflylund Yes, it does!

[@re_di_roma_is_back2388]

Exato!

[@re_di_roma_is_back2388]

E' portoghese con le u francesi

[@ISKLEMMI]

9:01 - It gave me a chuckle when José laughed when hearing the Catalan translation of sand. I've spoken Catalan and Spanish for decades now, but I've never thought about how the Catalan word 'sorra' would sound to the majority of Spanish speakers with a seseo accent.

[@josemorales347]

Yeah, i chuckled mainly because he started to laugh lol aún que no era lo correcto que hacer en ésa situación. Pero eu acho que faria a misma coisa tambem lol.

[@acolombo]

@@josemorales347 Why wasn't it the right thing to do? It was a must hahahaha

[@josemorales347]

@@acolombo just out of respect for the Catalan language.

[@angyliv8040]

@@acolombo sinceramente soy catalana y nunca me había fijado y es porque nosotros pronunciamos zorra con z igual la s de sorra es diferente a el seseo en hispano america. Está fuera de lugar y es muy cutre porque todos los catalanes sabemos castellano y sabemos el significado pero es otra lengua.

[@Omouja]

What "zorra" means?

[@anneonymous4884]

Very interesting. I can speak Castilian and standard Italian, so I kinda-sorta understand Friulian, but that's definitely a separate language.

[@vitoravila9908]

Several notes of French and Portuguese mixed in…

[@mamymimma]

These videos are always a pleasure to listen to 👏 thanks everyone!

[@timb7725]

Awesome. My mothers first language was Ligurian. She didn’t speak English until 6 years old. I grew up hearing it.

[@kaumingo]

Wonderful! The printed text saved me, after a bit the fog lifted and I tuned in to all four. ¡ Enhorabuena!

[@tyreesetranh4074]

An Piemont, davzin a la Liguria, as treuva (ant ël piemontèis comun): 1. limon 2. sabia 3. tòssi 4. ciòca 5. pregadé Ij dialèt locaj a podrìo avèj ëd paròle diverse.

[@SimonUslengh]

In Piedmontese (Turin, North-Western Italy) we say: 1. lemon: limon /li'muŋ/ 2. sand: sabia /'sɑbjɑ/ 3 poison: tòssi /'tɔsɪ/ or vrim /'vrɪm/ 4. bell: ciòca /'ʈʃɔka/ little bell/doorbell: /ʈʃu'kɪŋ/ 5. praying mantis: moniëtta /mu'njɘtɑ/ lit. 'little nun' It is always beautiful to hear the Genoese language. Piedmont and Liguria are very close, but the languages are very different, like one was open to the mainland, and the other was open to the wide seas.

[@ehmzed]

Yay Francesco again! Genoese is really one of the nicest sounding languages I've heard, though it even reminds me of Portuguese at times. It's amazing how many smaller languages still exist throughout Italy and Europe, this channel is very helpful to keep them alive. I'm from Tuscany but I only discovered the Genoese language last time Francesco was featured in one of these videos and I loved it, so it's really nice seeing him back in an episode centred on Genoese, and he's so cute, too!

[@ltubabbo529]

In Italia abbiamo tante lingue bellissime e uniche a modo loro, se finisse il razzismo linguistico che c'è, si potrebbe realizzare una ripresa delle nostre culture.

[@clementeperez2870]

I liked it very much! I could guess all five words. I speak some Italian and my mother tongue is Spanish. This helped with the solution. I'm learning Catalan and that was a help too, much more than French. Great work you did!

[@augustodaro2208]

Great video as usual. Less similar to French than I expected. Can't wait for the next one

[@fabiolimadasilva3398]

Para um brasileiro, o limão tem cor VERDE. Este cítrico se chama LIMA em Portugal. No caso da fruta do vídeo, nós brasileiros a chamamos de LIMÃO SICILIANO.

[@fabiolimadasilva3398]

Lima (Portugal) = limão taiti (Brasil).

[@fabiolimadasilva3398]

Temos também a laranja-lima que é outro cítrico.

[@ltubabbo529]

Molto interessante, perché proprio siciliano?

[@fabiolimadasilva3398]

@@ltubabbo529 boa pergunta. Não sei.

[@Rickan_]

Venezuelan Spanish speaker here. We also have the word "Cerbatana" when referring to the Mantis. Spanish from Spain has a big influence here, so the word Mantis has become more popular in recent years. Thanks for these videos! they are very interesting and challenging!

[@riccellpiovischini4652]

Toscego is clearly from the word toxicus (toxic)... in Portuguese we use the word veneno for (poison/venom) but in some contexts, also tóxico. Ligurian tends to turn K into g S into sh so...maybe that's the origin.

[@ltubabbo529]

Bom, mas acho que não é bem assim. O "X" em latim (e ainda está em italiano) corresponde ao som "ks". Portanto, o liguriano deve ter eliminado o k e depois alterado o S de [S] a [ʃ]

[@AdamSlatopolsky]

Tósego can also be said in Spanish.

[@Unbrutal_Rawr]

Every single Romance language changes the Latin X into something else. Italian and French have -ss-, while Ligurian, Spanish and Catalan have [ʃ] which they spell in different ways. Sometimes it even changes to _sk_ instead. But any Romance word with [ks] is a borrowing.

[@Omouja]

@@Unbrutal_Rawr in Portuguese the latin ks sometimes chenges to ss or ʃ, but in some cases we don't, like the word tóxico itself.

[@Unbrutal_Rawr]

@@Omouja You should have read my last sentence more attentively. Nothing changes in that word because it's a learned, scholarly word borrowed around the age of Enlightenment, and in addition borrowed primarily from Greek. It never passed through any changes, only received the native masculine ending. The historical changes we're talking about only describe what happened to native words inherited from Latin.

[@hoathanatos6179]

Sorra in Catalan, Saura in Occitan, comes from Saburra, a dialectical variant of Sabula.

[@geografisica]

I am Venezuelan as well and I speak also French and English. Yes in Venezuela we have ‘Mantis Religiosas’ as you see it in Europe, and most of them are greenish.

[@danielprado5486]

Pretty nice video! A small suggestion: I would very much like to watch a video with a speaker of an Asturian-Leonese language (Asturian, Leonese, Mirandese, Extremaduran, Cantabrian). I think there is no video on the channel with one of those languages.

[@alexaquino9361]

Muy bueno, lo descubrí hace días y me entusiasmo al escuchar idiomas varios y a los profesores o guías, saludos desde Argentina!!

[@jesusbarrios1994]

El venezolano se estaba riendo por la palabra sorra, en Venezuela es un insulto a la mujer jajajaja.

[@clementeperez2870]

También en España, pero escrito y pronunciado distinto: zorra.

[@pablobond_vzla]

En las playas suelen haber muchas sorras tomando el sol sobre la sorra

[@SzczeryPoliglota]

Te języki z północy Włoch dość często zjadają niektóre spółgłoski, przez co nadają sobie taki portugalski vibe :D Bardzo to sympatycznie brzmi na moje ucho.

[@yohanapereira1629]

As pronúncias parece o português

[@miguelramirez6352]

Wow! I understood the Galician and the Catalan better than I did the Lingurian, but I was able to guess the words in the correct form. My native language is Spanish, I'm from Bogotá Colombia.

[@ivanmolero7829]

12:22. In Spanish apart from "veneno" you can also say (though it is less common) "tósigo". Also the word "ponzoña".

[@matf5593]

J’adore ces vidéo car je comprends beaucoup plus que ce à quoi je m’attendais…. Même quand je suis perdu! 😅 Voir les paroles aide beaucoup

[@louismi.]

Igual yo, aunque estuvo un poco difícil adivinar la verdad JAJAJAJ

[@maignialfrancois8170]

En occitan (sud de França, al nòrd de Catalonha): 1) citron/limon 2) arena/sablina 3) veren 4) campana 5) prègadieu. Ai comprés sulcòp los mots 1, 2, 4 e 5, ai agut besonh d'un pauc mai de temps pel 3.

[@evaldomoreira3078]

Falo português BR, espanhol, entendo bem galego e espanhol. Acertei todas as 5 palavras também.

[@Haama10]

These videos are really cool! Would love to see something with finnic languages. (I'm willing to volunteer).

[@GabrielKaizer1]

9:05 a mesma reação que tive quando ouvir "trenó" em galego pela primeira vez kkkkkk

o momento inmaduro, digamos

[@noeliafernandz]

Moitísimas grazas por incluírdes o galego! Que vídeo tan interesante.

[@APorto-by8ys]

"Campá" and "sino" are synonyms in Galician, but the word "choca" is the specific one for animals. Thanks for the video!

[@Omouja]

Interesting, in portuguese is "sino", we have the word "campainha" but it means door's bell. I'm not sure but I think that for the specific one for animals is simply "sininho" (little sino)

[@patolt1628]

As a Frenchman, it's almost Chinese for me 😉. I listened carefully but it was not easy at all, although I was cheating a little since my mother was Catalan so that "knowing" 2 romance languages (plus a little Spanish) helps. I can still understand Catalan but I've not been speaking it since more than 50 years, so ... I would say that basically this language is not understable by a French speaking person. For the first word, I didn't understand why you say that the French word "citron" is a false friend. "Citron" in French is exactly what you call "limon". I probably misunderstood something ... Surprisingly the last word was the easiest because you said "insetto" and "religioso" : in French it's "mante religieuse" Regards

[@joseignaciocastrovonrodrig5613]

I think it's because "citron" in Ligurian means "orange". I could be wrong. Salut.

[@renatobabka263]

Very interesting. I was curious if a French would understand it hahaha to me, as a Brazilian, it was very easy to understand

[@patolt1628]

@@joseignaciocastrovonrodrig5613 OK. If in Ligurian "citron" means "orange", then indeed it's a false friend and I completely screwed it up. I confirm: not understandable by a French speaking person.

[@patolt1628]

@@renatobabka263 Well, you have the answer: it's no. By the way, we don't understand Portuguese either ... The only Romance language we can understand a little (I mean without any basic knowledge) is Italian. I know that Italian and Spanish can understand each other a little bit but I'm not sure they can understand French in speaking due probably to the specific French pronunciation. The Italians may be (we share 70% of the vocabulary with them) but for sure not the Spanish (from experience). In writting things are different. Regarding Portuguese it's the worst case (with Romanian): not at all understandable for French speakers. Personally when I hear Portuguese, I first think it's a slavic language like Polish or so. Due to a slightly different music of the language, I can identify Brazilian but anyway I understand ... nothing. However we speak a Romance language but with a kind of northern pronunciation so that it might be the reason why we are not basically tuned to understand easily the other Romance languages. My interpretation ...

[@renatobabka263]

@@patolt1628 it's exactly what happens with me. I can't understand French at all, maybe some few words, but it's way easier to read. The problem here sure is the pronunciation differences between our languages. The other romance languages isn't that difficult to understand without learning it, but Romanian. That's maybe at the same level of French for me 😂 So, even the Brazilian Portuguese you think it sounds like a Slavic language? That's very interesting! I always thought that happens with the European Portuguese only. But I understand it, somehow Russian sounds familiar to me, and I don't speak it. Same happens with Greek. I feel like it's someone speaking Portuguese, but using words I never heard before 😂 I also speak a bit of Czech (still learning) but it sounds completely different from Portuguese. So maybe it's the Russian sound the Portuguese is similar.

[@Roder79]

Gràcies CRACK!!!

[@YokoHimeda]

Omg! I, knowing a little bit of Spanish and French, guessed right two words, and almost guessed the word lemon (I thought it was orange) without turning on subtitles... wow 😳

[@ldrake2578]

Yes, same here! I was going with lemon as well...BUT when he mentioned citrus and something with false cognates, I had to go with "le pamplemousse." Oh well, always go with your first instinct I suppose.

[@carloscattaneo9779]

Interestingly; in Argentina, Boca Juniors’ fans are called “Xeneizes” because the club was founded by Ligurian migrants

[@krisssmike3378]

Cattaneo è uno dei cognomi più Genovesi che si possano trovare... Vedi "Simonetta Cattaneo"

[@carloscattaneo9779]

@@krisssmike3378 si lo sapevo 😊 comunque mio nonno migrò in Sudamerica dalla Lombardia!

[@krisssmike3378]

@@carloscattaneo9779 ecco, quando vieni a Genova, questa cosa non dirla... ;-)

[@carloscattaneo9779]

@@krisssmike3378 😆😆 grazie del consiglio 🤣

[@sergioad5604]

Very nice and engaging. When Francesco said "pateca" that in French is "pastèque" but the term derives from the Arabic "batikha", I presume aquired during the period of lingua franca mediterranea because in Italy it is known as cocomero (Latin Citrullus) and anguria (Greek ἀγγούριον).

[@maryocecilyo3372]

In my language Tetum, we also say pateka from Portuguese through French?

[@sergioad5604]

@@maryocecilyo3372 I think from Portugese only else you would have called it pastecca. The French influence was only to Levantines who actually spoke French.

[@Unbrutal_Rawr]

_cocomero_ is from Latin _cucumer,_ earlier _cucumis,_ meaning cucumber or something similar.

[@sergioad5604]

@@Unbrutal_Rawr sure, in Italy it is anguria and cocomero, both refer to the Greek and Latin cucumber. The point is where and when was it called pateca or pasteque, maybe when merchants spoke Sabir (knowledge or lingua franca mediterranea) from Arabic batekha. At that time in Africa only the seeds were eaten.

[@Unbrutal_Rawr]

@@sergioad5604 It surely does seem that way, given that Sabir words reached continental France by way of Genoa, while the rest of Italy was largely excluded from that language continuum.

[@osvaldobenavides5086]

Thanks!

[@lothariobazaroff3333]

Polish: 1. cytryna, 2. piasek, 3. trucizna, 4. dzwon(ek), 5. modliszka Welsh: 1. lemon/lemwn, 2. tywod, 3. gwenwyn, 4. cloch, 5. mantis

[@lerapol]

Slovenian: (1) Limona. (2) Pesek. (3) Strup. (4) Zvon. (5) Bogomolka. German: (1) Zitrone. (2) Sand. (3) Gift. (4) Glocke. (5) Gottesanbeterin. Czech: (1) Citrón. (2) Písek. (3) Jed. (4) Zvon. (5) Kudlanka. Bosnian: (1) Limun. (2) Pijesak. (3) Otrov. (4) Zvono. (5) Bogomoljka. Latvian: (1) Citrons. (2) Smiltis. (3) Inde. (4) Zvans. (5). Dievlūdzējs.

[@MN-fo8rd]

Great video, please do Barese next!!

[@massimopanza8582]

min 12:42 "toescego" = "tossico" [Italian] - cf. "toxic" in English (ultimately from Ancient Greek "τοξικόν [φάρμακον] = "toxic drug")

[@AdamSlatopolsky]

tósego in Spanish

[@VeraDonna]

I found this one tough to understand, even reading the subtitles! In my language, the mantis also has a religious name: louva-a-deus ("praises-god"). I'm a Portuguese speaker.

[@wordart_guian]

En occitan gascon: Citron Sabla/arena Poson Campana Prègadiu-Bernada

[@pliny8308]

I also was very impressed by the Catalan speaker. I think the centuries of contact between the peoples on the Mediterranean shoreline from Liguria to Southern France, to Catalonia, has impact all those languages. I managed very well indeed in Catalonia simply by speaking Italian very slowly, and likewise was able to understand a lot of Catalan if they spoke slowly. It was harder with Castilian, although I could understand a great deal. With standard French (langue d'oil), reading it was at 100% but understanding someone speaking French very quickly was much more difficult.

[@diogorodrigues747]

Galician is almost the same as Portuguese - literally 99% of the words are the same, they just use a different orthography closer to Spanish. In fact, three of the five words were the same as in Portuguese - "limão", "areia" and "campã" (it would be more common to say nowadays "campainha", but that's actually the diminutive form of "campã"). "Veneno" it's also used in some areas of Galicia too. The last one is the one that's actually quite different from Portuguese, since here we use "louva-a-deus" (literally "pray-to-god").

look up reintegracionismo

[@karm3667]

Whereas oral Portuguese is fully unintelligible for the Castilian speakers, oral Galician could be intelligible at times.

[@diogorodrigues747]

@@karm3667 Well, it depends a lot on the Galician. Whereas Galician from the TV is quite comprehensible, Galician from the countrysise is essentially like Portuguese.

[@karm3667]

@@diogorodrigues747 The current Galician language is not more related to Portuguese than it is to Castilian. The fact that Galician is the language that Portuguese comes from, doesn't mean that Galician has no connection with Castilian. Proof of it is that the guy playing the Galician speaker didn't know how "mantis" was translated into Galician and had to look it up in the Galician dictionary. However, he knew how "mantis" was said in Castiiian and didn't need a dictionary.

[@diogorodrigues747]

@@karm3667 The current Galician language is much more related to Portuguese than to Spanish, and I say this as a Portuguese that already went to Galicia several times. Stop saying sh*t... And yes, he's from Vigo, so it's not a great example at all. I bet he's not a native Galician speaker at all!

[@jgreen2015]

Got all of them! Though not always 100% but in the right area. The last one I got the quickest despite it meaning to be the hardest

[@nyko921]

Do a video about the pugliese dialect of Neapoltan, it's very distinct from the Katherine varieties of the language

[@fulviolumachi4940]

Francesco: bravo Nan che ti o parli coscì fluente o zeneize. Ti, ti gh'ae de rèixe de Rivéa ti? Che ti gh'ae tante parolle de comme dixan in Rivéa. Bravo davéi. Viva o nostro Zeneize.

[@kame9]

in catalán we have sorra and arena. arena is used more in belearic islnads. Sorra can use as an insult. Female fox and used similar in spanish " zorra".

[@jonarthritiskwanhc]

'Soră' is sister in Romanian, haha

[@AdamSlatopolsky]

@@jonarthritiskwanhc "Sor" in Spanish for "sister" and is used to call nuns

[@rucho94]

About that last part of your comment, yup that's why the Venezuelan speaker kinda giggled after the Catalan one told about sorra. :))))

@@rucho94 and of course the other two participants also knew why, they were just mature.

[@Enric.]

I guess "sorra" sounds a bit like "zorra" to some Spanish speakers, but it is not the same. The meaning is also completely different, "sorra" only means sand in Catalan, while fox is always guineu or guilla.

[@lottojjhghfgfdf8741]

Il genovese è la lingua che più assomiglia al portoghese nella pronuncia

[@stephanedumas8329]

Yes is more nasaly

[@giulianorivieri2806]

Ascolta la canzone "O frigideiro" di Bruno Lauzi

[@steverosenbaum9836]

Che bel sorriso che ha il ragazzo genovese!

[@ersavana4283]

giuro si mi madre é brasiliana e abita qua da tipo 27 anni e je lo dicono tutti

[@manoeldejesus2864]

Genovês que você chama é a mesma língua da Ligúria?

[@martelkapo]

Mi estas enamigita kun tiu ĉi belega lingvo! La forĵetitaj konsonantoj, la dentaj frikativoj, la ampleskaj vokaloj, la ortografio…ŭaŭ. Brave al ĉiuj, kiuj partoprenis! En Esperanto oni diras: 1. *citrono* 2. *sablo* (parenteze, la vorto "æña" estas unu el la plej mojosaj vortoj, kiujn mi iam ajn aŭdis en latinida lingvo!) 3. *veneno* 4. *sonorilo* 5. *manto*

[@pedroaraujo987]

Saluton, esperanta amiko!✌Varmaj kisoj el Brazilo

[@martelkapo]

@@pedroaraujo987 al vi brakumojn el Usono, kamaradin'! 💚

[@clementeperez2870]

Kvankam mi estas komencanto, ĉiam estas agrable povi legi Esperanton. Dankon!

[@IsabelGonzalez-re8kc]

Encantoume! 🥰👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

[@Karin-fj3eu]

1. Citron 2. Sand 3. Gift 4. Klocka (men inte en vanlig?) 5. Bönsyrsa

[@maria-elenalaflam4685]

Me sorprende saber cuantas lenguas puedo entender. Este idioma tiene partes de portuguese, frances, italiano, palabras cortadas, sinónimos y mucha intuición.

[@clukazz]

I was born in western Liguria (very close to the border with France) and our Ligurian dialect is a bit different from Genoese, with more influences from French. Very cool to hear a comparison with other Romance languages!

[@canalf007]

9:02 every spanish speaker laughed along with the venezuelan guy

[@isamukim1693]

La mayoría de hablantes de España no han entendido el chiste 😅

[@TenThumbsProductions]

I understood as much of Ligurian as I did Catalan, I barely noticed Galician wasn't Castellano. Hablo en tipo de Castellano de Anitoquia, Colombia.

[@joseignacio512]

I am a native Spanish speaker; I have some solid knowledge of French, a much weaker one of Italian, and for familial history reasons I have been recently painstakingly learning Ligurian from the very scarce resources available online, sort of building my own grammar book in the process. I must warn that I possess no linguistic training and I have no familiarity whatsoever with other languages spoken in Northern-Italy, such as Piedmontese, Emilian, Romagnol, etc. Having said that, I have the distinct feeling that Ligurian has been italianized in recent times, and more importantly, it seems to me that it is kind of a transition language bewteen French and Standard Italian. Now, even I find this appreciation hard to comprehend, as Southern-France has historically been a region of langues d'oc, not langues d'oil. Maybe someone with a robust training in this discipline may dilucidate this matter properly, and shed light on the topic; the key to the mystery could lie in the other Gallo-Itallic languages. Thanks.

[@ltubabbo529]

I don't quite understand, what is the mystery you are talking about?Ligurian is not a transitional language with French, at most it has some resemblance to Occitan, especially in the Riviera di Ponente. Ligurian today is in difficulty but has an important past, the Mediterranean lingua franca was in fact based essentially on Venetian and on a few Ligurian and Arabic words. This proves the naval power that the Republic of Genoa had. The similarity that exists in some aspects, such as vowel [y] it is given by the Celtic substrate or perhaps by the Lombard one [not today's one, the Germanic one, the ancient one]. This is why these vowels and other phenomena exist in Piedmontese and Lombard too. The difference between the languages ​​of north-western Italy and the rest of Italy is that these are latin-based, but with strong celtic influences, while in the center-south the influences are osco-umbrian, Sican and obviously greek. In the north-east there are Rhaetian and Venetic influences.

[@joseignacio512]

@@ltubabbo529 Thanks.

[@ltubabbo529]

@@joseignacio512 prego 😁

[@anaflorapimentelderezendem4639]

Que rapazes simpáticos!!! Amei o colóquio!!!🙌🙌🙌❤❤❤🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷

[@braincytox7314]

There're a lot of similiarities to sicilian - for example "piccina" for little or "u" as article and so on

[@ltubabbo529]

"a lot", piccina/picin/ci/cicinin sono parole che si usano un po' in tutta Italia. La U idem con patate. Non per essere antipatico

[@massimopanza8582]

min 16:30 Catalan "esquella" < Latin "squilla" - which in Italian can mean "trumpet" (even if this noun is confined to literary usage and is definitely old fashioned).

[@clementeperez2870]

In Spanish, the word "esquila" exists and it also means a little bell but I have never heard/used it.

[@bededaventiquattro2073]

Téuscego looks like "tossico" in Italian, which can be also a substantive in a formal/scientific context, like "i sintomi sono causati da un tossico" (symptoms are caused by a toxic substance)

[@florenciabarboza4549]

16:37... En español, el objeto que cuelga del cuello de los animales (en especial en animales de campo), se llama campana o mejor conocido como "cencerro"

[@clementeperez2870]

He buscado en el diccionario y he encontrado la palabra española esquila que significa pequeña campana y de parece mucho a la catalana "esquella".

[@Jgab602]

In portuguese: 1. Limão 2. Areia 3. Veneno 4. Sino 5. Louva-a-Deus (it means praises God)

[@diogorodrigues747]

4. Campainha (the diminutive form of "campã").

[@rucho94]

@@diogorodrigues747 where are you from? "Campainha" in my region actually only means "doorbell". In this case, we just use "sino" :)

[@diogorodrigues747]

@@rucho94 I'm from Almada.

[@Jumpoable]

Interesting... So Ligurian has the [y] sound for 'u' like French. & also caught some [œ] & [ø] sounds for 'o'. Now people shouldn't complain about modern Niçois speakers using a [y] sound for 'u' like it's Frenchified then as Niçois is supposedly similar to Ligurian (just across the border). Also the dropping of medial [r] between vowels... allora > alloa; parolla > paolla. LOL. That's cute.

[@Unbrutal_Rawr]

This vowel shift famously stretches all the way to La Spezia (the town gave its name to the La Spezia-Rimini line of isoglosses which group North Italian languages together with Gallo-Romance), so they definitely shouldn't complain.

[@waltroskoh8650]

Hey Norbert. Longtime fan of your channel here. What's up with the subtitles in this one? It seems like a different approach where the subtitles sometimes don't match what the speaker is actually saying but are .. edited to be more concise? For instance, when the speaker says "inte certe zone a l'e ciu fina inte certe zone a l'e ciu drua" the subtitles condense it to "inte certe zone a l'e ciu fina, inte atre ciu drua"? It's the same meaning .. but it's not what the speaker actually says, ya know? As somebody who's very much into Romance Linguistices, I much prefer the literal exact subtitles. Peace!

[@Ecolinguist]

I understand what you mean and I agree that having an exact transcription is better in many ways. In this case, however, that's the transcription I got and there was no time to change it. Transcribing and captioning for this kind of videos is very time-consuming and laborious and not all participants have experience doing it so I just need to be fine with whatever I got. Otherwise I'd never be able to publish any videos. Professional transcription services are very costly and often impossible to find for minority languages so we're just trying to do the best we can with the resources available. All the participants are volunteers. Thank you Waltros for your comment and supporting the project! 🤗

[@vazqcon]

I'm Galician, this sounds like a mixture of Italian and Brazilian Portuguese to me

[@Rolfwar]

It is a nice experiment, but I feel like it would be more interesting with participants who are just bilingual or trilingual at the most. The Galician dude speaks, other than Galician, 4 more languages (and all of them romance languages). I feel like with this kind of background, the results are skewed and it takes away from the value of "mutual intelligibility" of the experiment.

[@Ecolinguist]

Thanks for your feedback. Most of the viewers of the channel and volunteers are multilingual and it's not easy to find someone who speaks only one or two languages. We make these videos in a way that the online viewers from all kind of linguistic background can participate in the game and have their own unique experience. :)

[@maxmansi]

Yo hablo solo castellano, y todo lo que sea mediterráneo más o menos se entiende, aunque lo que decís tiene sentido.

from an academic perspective yes they'd be ruled out, but this is not academia, and it's fun and interesting at the same time.

@@maxmansi hasta el turco, el albanes, el griego, el arabe, el hebreo, el bereber, el croato entiedes? WOW

[@maxmansi]

@ No, lenguas romances o latinas (son las que hablan los participantes en el vídeo).

[@darthstony6950]

I wonder if there are resources somewhere for genoese

[@user-cw6cg3bl6d]

12:45 - "teuscego" (spelled "toscego" in the vid) totally sounds like "tossego" in Venetian, that simply means toxic, I guess the word for poison originates there. Same goes for the verb that he used "inteuscegâ" - venet. "intossegar" - ital. "intossicar": to poison

[@AdamSlatopolsky]

Tósego in Spanish, but seldomly used.

[@Serenoj69]

The problem is that quite a few here understand other languages too, some that are very close to eachother. So we cannot assess whether it is their native language or the one they learned that made them understand eachother.

[@jeffersonvieira7678]

As a southern brazilian, who speaks portuguese and know just a little bit of standar italian, I did'n understand a lot of things he said, it's a really diferent lenguage

[@davidprimo8236]

How did you learn ligurian? I'm interested in learning it aswell

[@joseignaciocastrovonrodrig5613]

Welcome to the boat! I am currently extremely interested as well in learning it for historic reasons; but comming across dictionaries, novels, grammars and native speakers is indeed very difficult, especially if you do not live in Genoa. Let me know and maybe we can form a group or organization of learners; that might make things easier and smooth our path to language acquisition up.

[@davidprimo8236]

@@joseignaciocastrovonrodrig5613 that'd be amazing! I'm in some Discord servers for other minorized languages and it works for me.

[@joseignaciocastrovonrodrig5613]

@@davidprimo8236 Hello, David. I have never used Discord and honestly right now I don't have time to learn to use it. But don't worry. We may hold a conversation on Telegram, for example (you can look for me in there as "Iosef Tesla"). Then, we can elaborate further on our reasons for learning Ligurian, share experiences, and what matters the most, jump into action and form a group of students and learn! Some advance, little actually, has already been accomplished by me. Best regards. Scignorîa!

[@graziabologna0300]

In Italian words are: 1) Limone/ Cedro; 2) Sabbia; 3) Veleno; 4) Campana; 5) Cavalletta.

[@clotildedecasaantici8065]

L' ultima sarebbe mantide religiosa

[@graziabologna0300]

@@clotildedecasaantici8065 grazie mille. Non l'avevo compresa bene perché per me che sono pugliese, il genovese è difficile...

[@maikopasma9176]

Interesting, here in Southern Italy (Calabria) we have our very local dialect, I've never heard people from the city use it, but here up in the mountain where I'm from, (especially older people) "arina" is used for sand, like in spanish "arena" but we change the e with i, it's not necessarily something I'd say because I only speak italian, altough I do understand our local dialect and that's how we say sand, in standard italian it's "sabbia"

[@ltubabbo529]

Puoi ancora imparare a parlare calabrese, che non è un dialetto dell'italiano. Questo passaggio da E a I è tipico di tutte e tre le lingue estreme del sud: Calabrese, Siciliano e Salentino. In italiano si può usare rena, anche se ovviamente sabbia è più frequente. Nel mio dialetto (perugino) si usa più rena che sabbia.

[@maikopasma9176]

@@ltubabbo529 io lo capisco, è questo l'importante, così posso comunicare con chiunque, ma non ho motivo per imparare a parlarlo, prima di tutto mi uscirebbe strano, (mi è stato detto, sono stato preso in giro quando ci ho provato, anche se sono nato e cresciuto in Calabria) e poi io non parlo l'italiano come scelta, è una cosa che è avvenuta naturalmente, io non penso a come devo parlare prima di aprire bocca, parlo e basta, e quello che mi esce quando parlo è l'italiano classico, non ci posso fare niente, capisci? Si! certo potrei imparare a parlare dialetto, ma non avrebbe senso perché io il dialetto lo capisco, e tutti capiscono l'italiano, quindi problemi di comunicazione non ce ne sono mai, poi io questo "calabrese" come lingua non l'ho mai sentito, ricordo un giorno che c'erano ospiti a casa di mio zio, avevano un accento comico e interessantissimo alle mie orecchie, gli chiesi di dove fossero, mi dissero il nome di una città, non la conoscevo e quindi dissi, "mai sentita.. ma in quale regione?" E mi risposero, "qui in Calabria", e io rimasi un po' perplesso, avrei giurato che fossero di un altra regione, perché anche se eravamo tutti calabresi, loro parlavano in un modo strano e con un accento strano che non avevo mai sentito, quel giorno ho scoperto che riassumere il modo di parlare definendolo solo "calabrese" è un'azzardata che in realtà non riassume proprio niente 😅, credo che siano dialetti, non hanno neanche una forma scritta, (o almeno quello della mia zona non ce l'ha, che è di montagna fra l'altro, infatti quando scendo verso sotto, in città, le cose cambiano)

[@ltubabbo529]

@@maikopasma9176 Che non ci possa fare niente non è vero, come ogni lingua anche il calabrese va usato altrimenti il cervello se lo dimentica o perde scioltezza. La tua è la classica storia di un ragazzo a cui è stato insegnato (anche indirettamente) a parlare solo italiano, è uno stigma che purtroppo in Italia (e qualche altro Paese multilingue) ci si porta dietro. La lingua locale si "dovrebbe" sapere per: appartenenza al territorio, identificazione personale, cultura e come tutte lingue, anche il calabrese può tornare utile quando ci si approccia ad altre lingue. Ad esempio io grazie al mio "dialetto" conosco tante parole italiane considerate eleganti/arcaiche/ricercate, è un vantaggio che ho acquisito senza sforzo. Attualmente il calabrese, col salentino e il siciliano è una delle 3 varianti della lingua siciliana o dell' "italiano meridionale estremo" (questi i nomi più usati). È classificato come lingua in pericolo di estinzione (non è ancora in una fase critica, ma la direzione è quella). In poche parole il più grande elemento culturale del sud rischia di scomparire, e questo ha più lati negativi (anche economico-turistici). Anche tante lingue africane, amerinde, oceaniche o asiatiche non hanno una forma scritta, l'avere o meno una forma scritta non è un parametro di misura. I confini regionali non riflettono quelli linguistici, in Friuli Venezia Giulia oltre all'italiano si parlano 4 lingue, in Puglia 3, in Sardegna 3 (4 se consideriamo il còrso come idioma distinto dall'italiano). Probabilmente hai parlato con persone del nord estremo calabrese, oppure te del nord hai parlato con quelli del centrosud. La Calabria linguisticamente infatti è "divisa" (non nettamente) in 2, l'area calabrese (quella simile al siciliano) e l'area Lausberg (così chiamata dai linguisti, quella similnapoletana). Altrimenti hai semplicemente parlato con uno che usava una varietà simile alla tua, e in queste situazioni gli italiani esasperano le differenze seppur minime, siamo gente campanilista. Tra l'altro tutte le lingue hanno delle varianti, sarebbe assurdo se il calabrese fosse identico in ogni zona. Come ultimo spunto, la tua varietà (è preferibile usare questo termine, dialetto è una parola che si porta molti stereotipi sbagliati) non avrà una forma scritta, anche se al 90% qualcuno nel passato nel tuo Paese l'avrà già fatta, ma la soluzione è molto semplice. La scrittura è identica a quella di città, basta modificarla per quelle poche differenze che ci sono, sempre se ce ne è un bisogno reale.

[@gateret]

In catalan we also have ‘arena’! In Mallorca and València we say that way always… and it’s also accepted as normative

[@fulviolumachi4940]

Continua a parlare il Calabrese. Tutte le lingue sono meravigliose- Un abbraccio da Genova.

[@andreabuti]

From central Genoa here: very strange accent, never heard before. Where is the speaker from exactly?

[@Fab300Rz]

9:02 I la paraula en català és sorra. Venezolano: *Dirty mind activated*

[@danik.5545]

Wow Ligurian sounds a lot like portuguese, very similar

[@lorenzor2555]

Sono italiano (Lombardo) e, benché sia una lingua strana è molto diversa dal Lombardo, capisco perfettamente tutto o quasi

[@Luigi-uj5ml]

Qui a Genova le "clementine" sono i "mandaranci". Un'impiegata della Posta, che di nome faceva "Clementina", era soprannominata dalle colleghe "Mandarancio"!

[@doctrinehigh]

As an Italian, I've understood way more Spanish, Catalan, and Castilian than Ligurian, that's an Italian dialect, very very similar to Portuguese

[@fulviolumachi4940]

Lamberto. Genoese is a language of the same age when Italian was being born. With its own grammar, pronounciation, phonetics, vocabulary and literature. To say something about it, the first thing that comes to my mind, the Treaty of Ninfeo of 1261, was written in Zeneize/Genoese together with latin and tatar.

[@nyko921]

Il genovese non è un dialetto italiano, è un dialetto del Ligure, che è una lingua diversa. C'è un motivo se non l'hai capito.

[@fulviolumachi4940]

@@nyko921 parlavi con me? Non si capisce dal messaggio. Certo Genovese è dialetto della lingua Ligure, che però, non chiamandolo nessuno "Ligure" nè gli italiani nè i Liguri non Genovesi, e per l'importanza assoluta di Genova in Liguria si dice Genovese.

[@nyko921]

@@fulviolumachi4940 no parlavo con l'altro

[@fulviolumachi4940]

It's not at all any dialect. Being a language with its own phonetics, grammar, vocabulary and literature. Being spoken and written in international treaties that the Republic of Genoa signed throughout centuries. One example for all: The Treaty of Ninfeo of 1261, written inTatar, Greek. Turkish and Genoese.

[@lorenzotonso2062]

Avete in programma di fare una puntata con il Piemontese?

[@ltubabbo529]

Magari

[@joselaloz]

Aloa es cómo el allora en el italiano estándar? Cómo el allors del francés

[@stephanobarbosa5805]

entendi quase tudo do falante de liguriano

[@riccellpiovischini4652]

Nni dialettu lugganès 'ste parrò lìgure sànno 1. zitròn (limón); 2. sàbbula/arina (aenn-a), 3. vènomu (toscego); 4. càmpana/sìgnula (campànn-a), 5. rogazzeò (cateinn-a divota). Sun appassionâo da 'stu canal. È multo intrestante di saver ccà puossa cumprênner tante autre lìngue novilatine.

[@judna1]

I'm Catalan and I have an uncle from El Salvador that laughed a lot when we told him that sand was "sorra" in Catalan, because in Latin American Spanish, it sounds like "zorra" which literally means a female fox, but it also means b*tch (prostitute)😅. "Arena" is also accepted in Catalan, though "sorra" is the correct term, sorry Latin American Spanish speaking friends 😅✌🏽. P.S.: I guessed thr words the first time around. Speaking Catalan, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and being learning French helped a lot. Oh! And I'm Catalan and I didn't know the word "metzina" for poisson, I've just learnt a word in my first language, interesting! And "pregadeu" ald "plegamans" sounded a bit familiar, but once again, I didn't use those words, I use "mantis".

[@ramonxavierdutra6380]

Estou surpreso como soa muito parecido à minha lingua, o português do Brasil

[@clotildedecasaantici8065]

Tosceugo significa tossico

[@stefaniac2095]

Che bello l’accento genovese

[@Cvmanuel227]

This is so awesome 😎 thank you algorithm. I speak Spanish and i understood the Ligurian more than Galician lol

[@emuka-art]

this dialect is somehow difficult as it has some french type pronounced words and phrases, its like a separate language within latin laguages. it has sooo much french and nasal sounds

[@joseignaciocastrovonrodrig5613]

Indeed, imho Ligurian in its origins is closer to the Langues d'oil than to Standard Italian. It has been heavily italianized in the last two centuries, tgough.

[@ltubabbo529]

@@joseignaciocastrovonrodrig5613 let's not exaggerate... Ligurian is a Gallo-Italic language, not a oil language.

[@fulviolumachi4940]

It is not a dialect. It is as old as italian they were born roughly the same time in High Middle Ages.

[@lucasherissontrindade9888]

Interesting im brazilian and i was searching about the italian surname of my father family (schinca) I found it from Genova in this region..

[@ricardsegurailozano1981]

In Catalan the word lemon exists in both genders "llimona" and "llimó"

[@AsafeFialho]

Tive que me guiar pelo Galego para entender. O Liguriano não entendi quase nada.