Wiktionary talk:List of languages

Objections

This will get HUGE, maybe Wiktionary_talk:By_language_language

-fonzy

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This page is already slow to load because of the huge number of links which it contains. The software must check every one of those links to see whether it exists.

Where a language shows links to every letter in alphabet, I would propose a single link to the overall index for that language.

I also note that index pages are currently in a variety of formats. I have made some format changes to ensure that these are all in a standardized format. This format may be somewhat arbitrary, but at least a standard format will be easier to remmeber.

Unless there is a large uproar against it I will make the changes to show a single link once the index formats have been standardized for a given language. Eclecticology 22:32 Aug 11, 2003 (UTC)

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I object! The accompanying list is too long for no useful purpose. Currently the list show 171 languages with most of them having no semblance of an index at all. They have been enterred by a person with an obsession for developing a long list of languages (including extinct ones). I have no reasonable expectation that this person will ever do anything to develop our knowledge of these languages.

Although there is no doubt a place for such a wish-list of languages, but I don't believe that this is it. I see the purpose of this article as being a top level navigation aid to languages that are actually included in Wiktionary.

I have considered unilateral action to deal with this, but would prefer to consider other opinions before I do this. Eclecticology 21:11, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Why not?

Jeez... why the uproar over a simple list of languages? If the servers can't handle a page with a few hundred links on it, we're all in big trouble. I see nothing wrong with a "wish list" of languages, as long as they will eventually have entries (i.e., they're "real" human languages). Note, BTW, that this page is linked to from Wiktionary:Multilingual coordination using the link-text "world's 6,500 languages", so obviously someone thought this was going to be a comprehensive list! Speaking of "real" human languages, what would the criteria be, exactly, for inclusion of a language? Please see Wiktionary:Criteria for inclusion, which I'm trying to expand. - dcljr 08:24, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Afrikaans is not an option in the list of languages

For some reason Afrikaans does not appear in the list of languages (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Main_Page#Wiktionary_in_other_languages), even though there is an index for it. How do I add it?

Are you looking at Wiktionary:List of languages - Afrikaans is there. You can add words to the index, by editing Wiktionary:Afrikaans index and then just click on the red links to create them. Good luck. SemperBlotto 09:11, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Ido in the search box

Question: when does the search box on the front at www.wiktionary.org get updated? Ido is not yet one of the languages featured there.

That page is modified through meta (m:Www.wiktionary.org template). So you will have to ask a sysop there to fix that. \Mike 11:36, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Thanks!

De-wikified languages list?

Is htis the right page to have the "top-40" languages that aren't wikified, as a section of the page? Anyone know where the latest version of that list is, these days? --Connel MacKenzie T C 00:34, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

• Wiktionary:Translations/Wikification. — Vildricianus 11:19, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

problems in A, beginning of B

• Acoma: is perhaps not the standard name for the language; I cannot find the ISO code. (kjq-aco?)
• Akan: is both a language and a language family, and is OK as-is, right?
• Akana: I can find no information about this language; we have no entry ([[Akana]]), no index and no category. (?!)
• 'Akhoe: we have no entry ([['Akhoe]]), no index and no category, so I am not certain, but I suppose this is a misspelling or alternative form of ǀʼAkhwe / Ekoka (ISO code: knw), one of the speeches of the !Kung dialect continuum. Is it?
• Andaluz: I cannot find enough clear information about this to determine if it is a dialect or a language, nor to determine its ISO code.
• Apache: is ambiguous, refers to a family, not to a specific language. We have no index and no category, so I would have simply removed it from the list, but thought I would list it here with the other problems.
• Arrernte: is a dialect cluster with at least two ISO codes. Should we spilt the entry into Eastern Arrernte and Western Arrernte, or treat them as one language and devise a Wiktionary code for it?
• Babylonian: is one of the forms of the Akkadian language. We do not list the other, Assyrian. Should we add Assyrian or remove Babylonian?
• Baluchi: is a macrolanguage. Should we remove it and replace it with the appropriate languages?
• Banda: is ambiguous. We have no entry ([[Banda]]), no index and no category, so I cannot tell whether one of the Banda languages is meant, or the separate language with the ISO code "bnd". "bnd", I guess?
• Bantu: is ambiguous, refers to a group of 250 languages, not AFAICT, any specific one of them.
• Bavarian: refers to several different speeches, but has an ISO code. Keep, I guess?

When I finish all of the sections, I will post in the BP for a wider audience. - -sche (discuss) 01:04, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

Riang

Table contains "ril Riang". But code "ril" should be replaced by "ria", see [1] and w:Kokborok. -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 11:50, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

Why? What's wrong with the current situation? —CodeCat 12:25, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

Ok, it shouldn't be replaced. I was wrong, but... There are:

• ril - w:Riang language (Myanmar)
• ria - w:Riang language (India)

In this table: "ril Riang". So language name "Riang" has two meanings. -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 13:07, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

You should probably propose changing the language's name at WT:RFM. —CodeCat 13:17, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

OK. Thank you! -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 14:22, 27 July 2013 (UTC)

I've addressed the matter, in that I've added 'ria' to the list under its attested alternate name "Reang" (with a note that it also goes by "Riang"), so that both are on the list and are distinguished from each other. - -sche (discuss) 05:19, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

RFD discussion

The following information passed a request for deletion.

This discussion is no longer live and is left here as an archive. Please do not modify this conversation, but feel free to discuss its conclusions.

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The bot-updated list at Wiktionary:Index to templates/languages is already more comprehensive. - -sche (discuss) 03:40, 23 August 2012 (UTC)

Redirect --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:18, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

• Redirect but only once the bot that maintains Wiktionary:Index to templates/languages is programmed to add links to each language's category and index. At the moment it only links to the code template (and those are all about to be deleted) and to the language name in mainspace. —Angr 14:50, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Kept as this is now the primary list, automatically updated through Lua. —CodeCat 12:50, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

Biblical Hebrew

Code hbo. Currently isn't listed, probably ought to be, unless you guys have an extended explanation why not somewhere.LlywelynII (talk) 12:08, 1 November 2013 (UTC)

We refer to it as Biblical Hebrew. —Stephen ^(Talk) 00:03, 2 November 2013 (UTC)

And, more to the point, it's subsumed into he; see WT:LANGTREAT. - -sche (discuss) 05:06, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

@-sche But the page description doesn't say it lists some of the languages we consider languages by wt:LANGTREAT. It says it's a list of all valid codes. If it's not that, we still need that list and that list should include hbo if it's a recognized code.

I came here precisely to find that language code, got nothing, and had to figure out to go autocomplete "Category:English terms derived from Bibl...", then go click one of those entries, then go "edit" one to see the underlying code. I shouldn't've had to do that, and others who wouldn't know to do so shouldn't have to learn/use such an kludge. — LlywelynII 16:25, 1 March 2024 (UTC)

The page isn't quite correct about what the common feature of the languages listed here is. I don't see the word "valid" anywhere, but it just about implies it, which is at least misleading by failing to mention that there are codes for valid etymology languages like Biblical Hebrew. I've updated the wording to hopefully be more accurate. However, you can find some etymology languages like Biblical Hebrew by checking for a category (Category:Biblical Hebrew), which generally is created by a bot if the language code is used in etymologies, or by searching Wiktionary:List of languages/special#Etymology-only languages. The latter list should be mentioned on this page (and is now) because the use of etymology language codes has greatly expanded recently. — Eru·tuon 17:38, 1 March 2024 (UTC)

Anglo-Norman

Is the term used by the OED. Is that equivalent to the "Norman" here? or should OED "Anglo-Norman" terms be placed in "Old French" here? I can't figure out how to edit the "alt names" section of this page, but please add the term to the appropriate code. — LlywelynII 04:23, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Anglo-Norman used to be considered a separate language on Wiktionary, but it was merged into Old French. This is reflected on WT:LANGTREAT. —CodeCat 04:27, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Doric Greek

should be covered by language code grc-dor but is currently missing here. — LlywelynII 22:00, 26 November 2015 (UTC)

It is covered by grc (specifically-Doric forms are indicated with context labels, as in ὄνυμα). - -sche (discuss) 08:58, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

Renaming Scanian to Old Scanian

Discussion moved to WT:BP.

No idea

why New Latin (code NL.) isn't displaying but it needs to so I can find it more easily than by hunting through category entries. Kindly fix whatever broken formatting code is currently omitting it. — LlywelynII 00:22, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

New Latin isn't a language, but an etymology-only code subsumed under la. So you'll find it in the list of etymology-only languages. —CodeCat 00:36, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

This isn't Wikipedia. The only reason to have a list of languages is for the codes we use here to be easy to find. In fact, the lead even says this is a "list of all the language codes that are recognized by Wiktionary".

Kindly merge them back or link prominently. — LlywelynII 00:39, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

Propose it at the Beer Parlour. —CodeCat 00:40, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

New Latin appears at "Wiktionary:List of languages/special". I'm not sure why a separate subpage was created for certain languages; it does make them a bit harder to look for. Could they not be moved into a section on the main page? — SMUconlaw (talk) 07:03, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

For technical/performance reasons, no. —CodeCat 14:40, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

I suppose the subpage could be transcluded on to the main page, but that would indeed make the page longer to load (and it already loads rather slowly). — SMUconlaw (talk) 15:59, 3 November 2016 (UTC)

Issue about the name of the "jiq" language here

I'm trying to add a Horpa word featuring Yelong Khrosgyabs (a dialect or a separate language aside from Guanyinqiao Khrosgyabs) and when I found out the default name of the langauge was Guanyinqiao here, and it would be absurd to have terms like Yelong Guanyinqiao since Guanyinqiao was just the name of a dialect of the Khrosgyabs language and the word I want to reference only exists in Yelong dialect but not in Guanyinqiao dialect.

I've also found out the template showed Yelong in Situ but they're quite different in fact as Yelong, alongside with other Khrosgyabs dialect, is a Western rGyalrongic language but Situ was a Eastern rGyalrongic language.

Here are some words comparisons between Yelong Khrosgyab(dʑa˧˧ro˥˥), Guanyinqiao Khrosgyab (ɡrəm˥˧de˦˦) and Situ, which could showed that Yelong is actually closer to Guanyinqiao than to Situ:

Yelong Khrosgyab | Guanyinqiao Khrosgyab | Situ | English

cçi˥˥ | cçə˥˧ | ʃtə | this

zɡrə˥˧ | zɡrə˥˧ | tsəuri | star

ɣmiˀ˥˥ | ɣmi˥˥ | tə-mȵɐs | wound

rvi˥˥ | rviu˥˧ | ʃə r̥pɑ | axe

fsoˀ˥˥ | fso˥˥ | kɑ-ʃpɑ | to be able to

Khrosgyab is a Western rGyalrongic language together with Horpa (Stau) and other minor languages without proper representation in the template, such as Xinlong Minyak (known as Xinlong Muya 新龙木雅 in Chinese, totally different language with Minyak or Muya languages in Kangding), Geshizha, Shangzhai etc. The whole Western rGyalrongic languages are poorly attested, but it's at least okay to recognize a dialect continuum called Khrosgyab here that includes Guanyinqiao 观音桥, Yelong 业隆, Ergangli(rGali) 二岗里/二嘎里 or Ere (Wobzi) 俄热. It's still not very proper to call all these different dialects as Guanyinqiao, which is only name of one of these dialects. S.G.Junge1997 (talk) 12:56, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

Yes, the overall language should be renamed from Guanyinqiao to Khroskyabs (although I'm using that spelling because it's more common than yours with -g-); calling it Guanyinqiao was an unfortunate move on Ethnologue's part, almost certainly copied here as part of the mass import of language codes and names long ago, without any intentional decision to choose it (Guanyinqiao) over Khroskyabs. As there are no entries yet, I will take the opportunity to rename the language while that's still easy to do. Actually, it proved more difficult than I thought now that the aliases are in another module, but it's done. I have not split the dialects; if you feel strongly that they should be treated as separate languages, say so (and ideally provide reference works which support such a move). :) Thanks for bringing this up. - -sche (discuss) 21:42, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

Achang & Ngochang

Achang & Ngochang(also called 茶山 Chashan in China), while both of them belong to Burmish branch in Sino-Tibetan languages, are two different languages. It's wrong to use the term Achang(code acn) to refer to both of them. The only feature they share is the similarity of their autonyms. Can we have a own code for Ngochang?

BTW Here's some examples to show how Ngochang differs from Achang(Longchuan dialect), also in comparison with Lacid which is the actually closest language of Ngochang.

Achang Ngochang Lacid Meaning

kʰʐə˥ kji̠˧ kji̠˧ star

ti˥ tʃəi˥˧ kjit˧˩ water

tʰɔ˧˥ tɔ̠ʔ˥˧ tɔ̠ʔ˥˧ to get up

m̥ɔ˧˩ ŋɔ̠˥ ŋɔ̠˥ to borrow

ʑom˧˥ tʃəŋ˥ tʃəŋ˥ to believe

張元宗 (talk) 12:01, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

@-sche, please take a look at this and the section before. I haven't got the time/inclination to sort this one out at the moment. To OP: normally this kind of thing is discussed at WT:RFM, and people will likely miss this discussion, but given the topic at hand, we may be able to handle it here. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 14:09, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

Glottolog separates "Achangic" into Lianghe Achang, Longchuan Achang (which they consider to be what the code acn refers to), Luxi Achang, and Ngochang. (The first three line up with the principal locations where Achang is spoken in China: Lianghe County, Longchuan County, and Luxi City. Wikipedia says Achang is also spoke in Longling County, and mentions the Chintaw or Xiandao 仙岛 dialect /kʰan˧˩ tau˧˩/ spoken in Yingjiang County.) Ngochang, as described in the references Glottolog and Wikipedia compile and others I can find, is spoken in Myanmar/Burma. Douglas Inglis says the phonology is "comparable" to Achang and says "A language survey is needed to determine the exact relationship between Ngochang and Achang but the people say it is the same language." The few Achang entries we have use the written form Ngochang uses, e.g. jeis where we handle the different pronunciations well in the pronunciation section. On the other hand, David Bradley's Burmic Languages in Myanmar speaks to considering them separate languages:

"Ngochang is a complex group comprising four main spoken varieties: the Ngochang variety spoken in Myanmar by about 35,000 people [...] and in China three other varieties within the Achang national minority with a total ethnic population of 39,555, some not able to speak any variety of Achang. [...] the most vigorous variety in China, with about 15,000 speakers including some local Chinese, is [...] spoken in the Husa valley of northwestern Longchuan County, [...]. The Chinese linguistic literature treats as a separate language a subvariety of Lasa Achang called Xiandao by Chinese scholars [...] they are in the process of losing their Lasa Achang speech. [...] In addition to living in China, the Husa Achang often travel to work and live in Myanmar, as blacksmiths in Shan villages in the Kachin State of as Buddhist monks. Husa Achang and Myanmar Ngochang are not easily mutually intelligible, and should probably be classified as distinct languages; it remains to be determined whether Myanmar Ngochang is mutually intelligible with Lianghe or Luxi Achang, but this seems unlikely based on lexical and phonological differences; thus perhaps Ngochang/Achang needs to be divided into four languages, two of which are spoken in Myanmar."

It seems like we could go either way, either cover the different spoken forms in pronunciation sections like for Chinese, or treat them as separate languages. We could ping editors who edit Burmese and Chinese to see if they could find out any more in Burmese and Chinese-language sources, but I don't know that we have any editors with expertise on Achang, sadly. - -sche (discuss) 21:22, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for your kind reply!

And, please forgive my poor English.

I've read these sources you mentioned before, but I couldn't understand why Douglas Inglis said so, that Ngochang is "comparable" with Achang. Maybe he only looked at the Luxi variety, which don't have voiceless nasals.

David Bradley once considered Achang to be same with Ngochang too, therefore he only listed Achang into the family tree of Burmish near Lashi , which should actually be the place of Ngochang, in his Tibeto-Burman languages and classification in 1997. Then he noticed their difference, and that's what he explained in Burmic Languages in Myanmar. However, since the classification Glottolog uses was based on Bradley(1997), his new opinions were left unreflected.

On the other hand, there's another tribe living in 片馬, which was actually one town with Phimaw in Myanmar, who speaks a very similar language with Ngochang, and they're called 茶山 Chashan by Han which was actually the overall name for Lashi. A research has been done by Chinese linguist 戴慶廈 Dai Qing-Xia, and in the book (片馬茶山人及其語言, Pianma(=Phimaw) Chashan and their language published in 2010) he mentioned that the language is closest to Lashi.

And furthermore, Japanese linguist 西義郎 Nishi Yoshio separated Burmish languages into two branches: Burmic and Maruic. Burmic changes the proto-glottalized consonants into voiceless ones, while Maruic shows tense vowels. Achang shows voiceless ones so it belongs to Burmic, together with Burmese, but Ngochang has tense vowels, so it should be actually Maruic in the classification by Nishi.

BTW, Longchuan Achang is also spoken in Myanmar, where they're called မိုင်းသာ Maingtha and identified as a tribe of Shan maybe due to their religion.

Hence, I suggest that the Ngochang language, together with Chashan, should be considered as a independent language from Achang. 張元宗 (talk) 03:36, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

Ok, I've created a separate code for "Ngochang", "tbq-ngo", and separated it out in jeis, providing an example of how it's used if you'd like to create more entries. If anything else needs to be done, please let me know. Can you check if any further changes need to be made to the entries jeis or ngos (and make them if necessary), and in particular do you know if the Achang dialects indeed spell their word for "water" jeis? - -sche (discuss) 21:00, 23 October 2021 (UTC)

Sorry for noticing this so late. Actually, none of Achang dialects has a widely recognised orthography yet, and these two spellings definitely belong to Ngochang. The best orthography for possible real Achang entries should be only IPA for now. Janinga Chang (talk) 09:42, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

Can the language code be changed?

There isnt a code for Malto instead it has the code for its 2 main dialects kmj – Kumarbhag Paharia and mjt – Sauria Paharia even though they are intelligible and commonly considered the same language AleksiB 1945 (talk) 09:41, 3 July 2022 (UTC)

@AleksiB 1945: I suggest you raise this for discussion at “Wiktionary:Beer parlour”. — Sgconlaw (talk) 13:12, 3 July 2022 (UTC)

Also some other changes like nit for "Naiki" (common name) instead of "Southeastern Kolami" and "Konda" instead of "Konda-Dora" AleksiB 1945 (talk) 14:26, 3 July 2022 (UTC)

Language family

A number of languages are classified as Sogdo-Bactrian. There is absolutely no consensus among scholars on the existence of such a branch, and certainly Khwarezmian is no part of it. Would it not be possible to at least classify Khwarezmian as an Iranian language -- that's it? ProjectDialex (talk) 15:33, 25 October 2022 (UTC)

Fortsenal/Kiai

The Fortsenal/Kiai language currently is only listed under the name Fortsenal with no listed other name. However, both names are used to refer to the same language, so both names should be listed. Also, both Tyron (2010) and François (2015) and Wikipedia name the language as Kiai, so Kiai might be a better place to put this, especially as Fortsenal is only one of three villages that speak the language. Donopi (talk) 07:14, 11 December 2023 (UTC)

Proto-Micronesian

Proto-Micronesian is not currently listed among the other proto-languages in the "Exceptional codes" section, despite Proto-Micronesian being a well-established ancestor of the Micronesian languages (Bender et al, 2003). The inclusion of Proto-Micronesian in the etymologies of Micronesian-language entries is a necessary part of a complete etymological history, and, in some cases, the Proto-Micronesian reconstruction is the only established link between certain terms (e.g., Proto-Micronesian *faa "string, be strung"). Additionally, this would allow for the creation of Proto-Micronesian Reconstruction pages, making the historical comparison of Micronesian-language terms significantly more straightforward. Kissebanere (talk) 04:20, 7 February 2024 (UTC)