Friday, October 31, 2008

Languages with the longest words

While nobody has ever calculated the average length of words, it’s commonly believed that the Welch language has the longest words:


Welsh town names are long words!

The Welsh is even longer than German, where they paste many words together into a single large word.

- Datenbanknen = database
- Gepäckaufbewahrungsschein = luggage check ticket
- Hoechsgeschwindigkeitsbegrenzung = maximum speed limit

But I have a new contended for the world’s longest words. The folks in Greenland folks speak Greenlandic, noted for super-long words, a real mouthful.


A sample of long words in Greenlandic

There are long words on their web sites too:


Long words on a Greenlandic web site

I suppose we will never know what language has the longest words, but don't rule out Greenlandic!