5 Comments What do you call a hobbit from the Basque Country? by cringeyjokesman December 23, 2022, 3:17 pm 12 Points Upvote Downvote
Irulegui Hand: Researchers claim to have found earliest document written in Basque 2,100 years ago by HistoryBuff November 15, 2022, 9:56 am 12 Points Upvote Downvote
1 Comment TIL a minority of the world’s languages are “ergative”—the object of a transitive verb & the subject of an intransitive verb are treated the same. For example: whereas in English we’d say “SHE likes HER” & “SHE walks”; in Basque (spoken in N. Spain/SW France), it’d be “SHE likes HER” but “HER walks” by whatilearned August 29, 2022, 9:42 am 12 Points Upvote Downvote
2 Comments TIL that French schools used to assign ‘Le Symbole’ to kids caught speaking minority languages(i.e. Breton, Occitan, Basque, etc). The only way to rid oneself of the symbol is to snitch on a fellow student. At the end of the day, the student with the symbol will receive some form of punishment by whatilearned March 6, 2022, 3:12 pm 12 Points Upvote Downvote
TIL that there was once spoken a Algonquian–Basque pidgin, or a language combining elements of the Native American Algonquian language and the Basque language from Spain. It was spoken between Basque whalers and local Algonquian people in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence in Eastern Canada in the 1600s. by whatilearned February 26, 2022, 7:33 pm 12 Points Upvote Downvote
1 Comment TIL there are tons of Arborglyphs (carvings on live trees) spread throughout the Western United States. They were made by Basque Sheepherders from the mid-1800’s through the 1970’s. by whatilearned February 1, 2022, 11:45 pm 12 Points Upvote Downvote
TIL that the Basque language is a “language isolate” – it seems to have no genetic relation to any other known language. It is thought to be the last surviving remnant of an ancient language family that existed in Western Europe before the arrival of the Indo-European languages from the East. by whatilearned January 13, 2022, 11:55 am 12 Points Upvote Downvote
1 Comment TIL In 2015 a district in Iceland repealed a 400-year-old decree to kill any Basque caught in the area on sight. The edict was issued in 1615 after a storm destroyed 3 Basque whaling vessels on an expedition in Iceland. The crew resorted to robbery that eventually led to the Slaying of the Spaniards by whatilearned June 20, 2021, 7:17 pm 12 Points Upvote Downvote
6 Comments TIL that in Westfjords, a region of Iceland, it was law from 1615 to as recent as 2015 that any Basque person in the region should be killed on sight by whatilearned April 1, 2021, 9:36 am 12 Points Upvote Downvote
4 Comments TIL that Basque sailors didn’t die of scurvy because they drank 3 liters of cider everyday which, unbeknownst to them, contains vitamin C. by whatilearned March 26, 2021, 3:26 pm 12 Points Upvote Downvote
4 Comments TIL that Basque, although considered to be a language isolate, actually had a predecessor in the form of Aquitanian, which died out almost 2,000 years ago. by whatilearned March 25, 2021, 6:04 am 12 Points Upvote Downvote
cringeyjokesman
HistoryBuff
whatilearned