Languagle #77: Macedonian
Јазикот е поостар и од сабјата
Jazikot e poostar i od sabjata
"The tongue is sharper even than the sabre."
What it means
Words can wound more deeply than a weapon. A sharp remark can do more harm than a sabre, so be careful what you say.
How to say it
YA-zi-kot eh PO-os-tar ee od SAB-ya-ta
Macedonian stress is easy: it always falls on the third syllable from the end. Ј is the y in 'yes'.
Word by word
- Јазикот YA-zi-kot: the tongue (јазик, tongue)
- е eh: is
- поостар PO-os-tar: sharper (по- turns sharp into sharper)
- и ee: even
- од сабјата od SAB-ya-ta: than the sabre (сабја, sabre)
Јазик is a tongue and јазикот is the tongue: the 'the' goes on the end.
Where it was found
Macedonian calls a proverb a pogovorka (поговорка). This one is from Macedonian Wikipedia's list of folk sayings.
Similar sayings
- Hawaiian: I ka ʻōlelo nō ke ola, i ka ʻōlelo nō ka make. In speech there is life; in speech there is death. (Languagle #32)
- English: The pen is mightier than the sword
How to recognise Macedonian
Macedonian uses Cyrillic with three letters of its own: ѓ, ќ and ѕ. It shares ј, љ, њ and џ with Serbian, but where Serbian has ђ and ћ, Macedonian has ѓ and ќ. Bulgarian, its closest relative, uses щ, ъ and ь and no ј. Like Bulgarian and Romanian, Macedonian puts 'the' on the end of a word.
About the Macedonian language
Macedonian is a South Slavic language spoken by around 1.5 million people, mainly in North Macedonia, where it is the official language. It is closely related to Bulgarian. Unlike most Slavic languages it has almost no noun cases, and it adds 'the' to the end of a word: jazik is 'tongue', jazikot 'the tongue'. Its standard written form was set in the 1940s, using a Cyrillic alphabet with letters of its own, such as ѓ and ќ.