Endangered Alphabets: The Quiz
Time for a little light-hearted break, I think.
When I first went on Omniglot.com, I was struck by so many things, among them the number of languages I’d never heard of, and the number of languages that either seemed to have been made up recently for intellectual amusement or seemed to be altogether fictitious.
So with that in mind, I offer you this little quiz. Needless to say, you can find the answers on the Internet very quickly. The aim is for you to try to see how far you can get without cheating (i.e. researching via omniglot, wikipedia, ethnologue, and so on). Here goes:
1. Which of the following are writing systems specifically created for films, TV series, works of fiction, as alternatives to existing scripts, or purely for intellectual amusement?
Arahauvarf
Asha’fru’kretobi
Beadscript
Daedric
Elder Futhark
Elvish
Hexahue
Ishirkian
Klingon
Pollard Miao
Qelsh
2. Which of the following are genuine names of existing languages, and which are anagrams of genuine existing names of existing languages?
Hunzib
Lezgi
Lule Sami
Malayalam
Meetei Mayek
Sranan
Tsez
Udmurt
Veps
Wolof
Yaghnobi
3. A number of alphabets or syllabaries are thought or known to have been the creation of a single person. Which of the following did NOT create an alphabet? (There may be more than one correct answer.)
Bn’nn’n
King Farnavaz of Georgia
Dr. Flo Darvin Lewis
Sir Isaac Pitman
The Reverend James Evans
Mesrop Mashtots
Momolu Duwalu Bukele
Sequoyah
St. Cyril
George Bernard Shaw
Zog of Albania
Have fun!