• iconNews
  • videos
  • entertainment
  • Home
  • News
    • UK News
    • US News
    • Australia
    • Ireland
    • World News
    • Weird News
    • Viral News
    • Sport
    • Technology
    • Science
    • True Crime
    • Travel
  • Entertainment
    • Celebrity
    • TV & Film
    • Netflix
    • Music
    • Gaming
    • TikTok
  • LAD Originals
    • Say Maaate to a Mate
    • Daily Ladness
    • Lad Files
    • UOKM8?
    • FreeToBe
    • Extinct
    • Citizen Reef
  • Advertise
  • Terms
  • Privacy & Cookies
  • LADbible Group
  • UNILAD
  • SPORTbible
  • GAMINGbible
  • Tyla
  • UNILAD Tech
  • FOODbible
  • License Our Content
  • About Us & Contact
  • Jobs
  • Latest
  • Topics A-Z
  • Authors
Facebook
Instagram
X
Threads
Snapchat
TikTok
YouTube

LAD Entertainment

YouTube

LAD Stories

Submit Your Content

Home> Community

Published 14:44 25 Jun 2023 GMT+1

Incredible video shows what ancient languages actually sounded like

You might not know what they're saying but they sound damn good saying it

Joe Harker

Joe Harker

If you're ever planning on travelling through time there's probably a few things you'd want to prepare for before making your trip.

However, even if such a machine could be made, there's all sorts of dangers involved - including the possibility that you'd never make it back to your own timeline.

Whether that's because you created an alternative timeline with your first journey and now can never find your way home or because some mishap befalls you along the way is a mystery.

Advert

Obviously you'd need a machine that also travels through space as well, because if you merely travelled through time the movement of planets would likely leave you trapped in space.

How would you pronounce 'thingy-thingy-bird-fish' in the proper Ancient Egyptian?
Alain Guilleux/Alamy Stock Photo

Of course, once you actually get there plenty more hurdles to overcome present themselves, not least that you'd likely have no idea how to communicate with anyone.

While it would be undeniably cool to visit the pyramids of Ancient Egypt back when they were much newer or to get a front row seat to Caesar's assassination, the language barrier would be pretty difficult to overcome.

You'd be a weirdo in strange clothing whom nobody could understand, and even if you went forwards in time just try keeping up with the slang.

Advert

While you might not know what they were saying, it would still be quite the experience to hear ancient people's speak their own languages in their own accents with the pronunciations we wouldn't know.

In the footage above, we've got what could be pretty close estimations for what ancient languages would have sounded like when spoken by those who would have used them every day.

From what we can hear Ancient Egyptian is certainly a striking language, while there's plenty enough of modern speech to recognise in how the Romans spoke.

"I'm sorry, I don't understand you. Let me just pull up Google Translate and... no signal. Damn."
David Stansbury/Smithsonian National Postal Museum

Of course without the aid of an actual time machine we can never be completely certain exactly how ancient civilisations really sounded.

Advert

What we can do is approximate and estimate based on what we know, and understand that there would be no one nailed down tone people would speak in.

Think of how many people around the world speak a language like English and how many accents that comes in.

Nonetheless, experts are able to work out a lot by comparing ancient languages to ones which have succeeded it like Italian, French and Spanish being descended from Latin.

The more researchers learn about a language the more educated the guess they can make about what it sounded like.

Featured Image Credit: World History Archive / culliganphoto / Alamy Stock Photo

Topics: Science, Weird, History

Joe Harker
Joe Harker

Joe graduated from the University of Salford with a degree in Journalism and worked for Reach before joining the LADbible Group. When not writing he enjoys the nerdier things in life like painting wargaming miniatures and chatting with other nerds on the internet. He's also spent a few years coaching fencing. Contact him via [email protected]

X

@MrJoeHarker

Advert

Advert

Advert

Choose your content:

10 hours ago
13 hours ago
14 hours ago
a day ago
  • 10 hours ago

    Man who has spent years studying natural disasters reveals how likely an apocalyptic-level event really is

    The likelihood of a natural apocalyptic-level event wiping us all out has been revealed

    Community
  • 13 hours ago

    Man who visited all 197 countries in world says best he has been to has ‘everything you could want’

    The bloke has seen all sorts on his travels

    Community
  • 14 hours ago

    Images show inside of ‘Black Mirror style’ building that houses 20,000 people

    The place is like its own town

    Community
  • a day ago

    Real reason why Ancient Greek statues all have tiny penises

    Perhaps they're all growers, not showers

    Community
  • Chilling footage shows unimaginable reality of what a nuclear explosion actually looks and sounds like
  • Photo of giant ‘human-sized bat’ isn’t actually fake
  • Recording of what mummy's voice would have sounded like leaves presenters in stitches
  • Inside remote island where ancient human species could still be alive and roaming