Language Reports

In 1799 French soldiers discovered a large stone near the town of Rosetta. Egyptian priests created the stone in 196 BC to honor their pharaoh. The writing on the stone appeared in two languages and three scripts and was instrumental in unlocking the key to ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. The stone became known as the Rosetta Stone.

According to the Inupiat Eskimo Dictionary by Webster and Zibell, the Inupiat have 32 words that describe types of snow or snow conditions. For example: ayak: snow on clothes,
kannik: snowflake, nutagak: powder snow.

Afrikaans is one of eleven official languages of South Africa. At about 90 years old, it is one of the world's youngest. A mixture of Dutch, German, and other languages, it is spoken by descendants of Dutch settlers.

Here’s a sentence containing nine ways the combination "ough" can be pronounced: A rough-coated, dough-faced, thoughtful ploughman strode through the streets of Scarborough; after falling into a slough, he coughed and hiccoughed.

"Uncopyrightable" is the longest English word with no repeated letters.

In 1945 a computer at Harvard malfunctioned and Grace Hopper, who was working on the computer, investigated, found a moth in one of the circuits and removed it. Ever since, when something goes wrong with a computer, it is said to have a bug in it.