What are these countries, which are written in the script of their own official languages? For the final three, the country names are written in each of two of their countries' official alphabets.
Dang! Maldivian was my favourite, because it's the only one I didn't know their language is in a different script. Several others can read that clue OK, but we should make this accessible to everyone, so I've put a different question in its place.
Wow - I just saw this and am sorry that the Thaana script for the Maldives is gone. It reads, in our script, "Dhivehi Raajje," or Dhivehi kingdom. Dhivehi is the language and, mostly archaically, refers to the people of the Maldives as well. It's the most phonetically consistent system I'm familiar with (almost without exception, every letter makes the same sound every time, with accents built in). I've taught the script, mostly just for fun, to lots of students over the years, who generally can begin to read and write in less than an hour.
Great quiz! I learned to pronounce Cyrillic, Hebrew, and Arabic ... and a couple of years ago actually created a spreadsheet with countries in their own names for some other project. That greatly helped with the more obscure South Asian scripts (and though I have no clue how to pronounce Amharic, it has a very distinct look).
I was so sure that #5 had to be Kazakhstan. I always guess it as Kazachstan though and thought that would be right cause it counts in the Countries of the World quiz. I guess I smashed together German Kasachstan with English Kazakhstan.
The usually accepted kazakstan didnt work either. I know the correct spelling though (a quarter of the time my fingers decide to skip the h, (and z in kyrgyzstan) and since I know it is accepted spelled like that I continue typing.)
just a heads up :) I simply figured the exact spelled was needed and was fine with that. (Especially since this is not just about the countries but about the words)
Ethiopia (I still managed to guess that one), Armenia (even though I'm supposed to have an Armenian font installed), Eritrea and the Berber (?) script of Morocco don't show up for me. :(
For learning puposes: would it be possible to give the english transliteration for the words after the right country has been guessed?
For example: Hellas for Greece.
Countries like Armenia and Georgia can be guessed based on the script, but I have actually no idea what that word should read, how an Armenian calls its own country.
Sure; they now appear in the answer list in the stats section after you finish the quiz. An interesting anomaly: Қазақстан has the same letter in the first and 5th places, so why do they appear as different transliterations (first K, then KH) in Latin-alphabet renderings of that country?
In that case, why would the Russians render that Kazakh name using two different letters (Russian K in Казахстан = K and Russian X = "kh", by the way).
Armenian looks like a mighty confusing language to read. Trying to distinguish the individual characters gives me a headache. Though that could be because I'm not wearing my glasses.
Hi Jerry. Just came back from Uzbekistan and they have switched to Latin scipt many years ago. The Cyrillic is almost gone from any signage (except where it's aimed at Russian tourists :) )
Great Quiz, Great Idea. It's awesome. But please remove Bharat in the other language other than Hindi, I think it's Tamil or Telegu which is not our official or national language. It's our recognised language along with the other 21 languages. So please keep India in hindi or add all the 22 recognised languages. Thank you ; )
Thanks for the compliment! The languages used here are Hindi and Telugu, and they are simply a couple of examples. They are not intended to be an exhaustive list of alphabets used in India.
I'm sorry, neither is Hindi an official or national language of India. Both Hindi and Telugu are of equal status as major recognised languages in the Constitution
For Greece, I think, "Well, that looks like the Greek alphabet." Proceeds to try all the countries near Greece, but somehow didn't actually guess Greece.
Ethiopia, Cambodia, Laos and Eritrea aren't rendering for me. It's probably just on my end because I have an outdated version of Chrome. Cool quiz nonetheless.
There are a handful that you can narrow it down a bit, other than that it’s pure pot luck. Unless you happen to have knowledge of said country/have been there or study these things.
I beg to disagree with the Indian clue. Thanks for adding 2 of our languages (I speak both) but I'm given to understand that the second (Telugu) is not the second-most commonly spoken language in India. It's not even close, in fact, and the second-most commonly spoken vernacular language is Bengali.
75% got South Korea?! Well, I guess the results show as much about quizzers' native languages (and where they live) as about their knowledge of foreign scripts and languages!
ދިވެހިރާއްޖެ
just a heads up :) I simply figured the exact spelled was needed and was fine with that. (Especially since this is not just about the countries but about the words)
For learning puposes: would it be possible to give the english transliteration for the words after the right country has been guessed?
For example: Hellas for Greece.
Countries like Armenia and Georgia can be guessed based on the script, but I have actually no idea what that word should read, how an Armenian calls its own country.
good to expose people to all the beautiful scripts
There are a handful that you can narrow it down a bit, other than that it’s pure pot luck. Unless you happen to have knowledge of said country/have been there or study these things.
Could you fix this?