7.0 KiB
| title | chunk | source | category | tags | date_saved | instance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| List of polyglots | 3/6 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_polyglots | reference | science, encyclopedia | 2026-05-05T08:12:10.749388+00:00 | kb-cron |
=== 20th century ===
==== 1900s ==== Sukarno (1901–1970), Indonesian politician. He spoke Javanese, Sundanese, Balinese, Indonesian, Dutch, German, English, French, Arabic, and Japanese. Dora Bloch (1902–1976), Israeli hostage. She spoke Hebrew, Arabic, Russian, German, English, and Italian. Steven Runciman (1903–2000), British historian. He began learning French, Latin, Greek, and Russian at a young age, and later learnt Bulgarian, Old Church Slavonic, Armenian, and some Turkish. He may also have had some knowledge of Arabic and a number of other languages. John von Neumann (1903–1957), Hungarian mathematician. He spoke Hungarian, English, German, and French, and also knew Latin and Greek. Syed Mujtaba Ali (1904–1974), Bangladeshi writer. He knew Bengali, Urdu, Hindi, Gujarati, Marathi, Sanskrit, Persian, Pashto, English, German, French, Italian, and Arabic. Pent Nurmekund (1906–1996), Estonian linguist. He could read over eighty languages and could speak a great many of them. H. S. David (1907–1981) Sri Lankan priest. He reportedly knew thirty-three languages: Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Tulu, Kui, Brahui, Sinhalese, Hindi, Vedic, Sanskrit, Prakrit, Pali, Avestan, English, Dutch, German, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Latin, Greek, Lithuanian, Russian, Malay, Arabic, Hebrew, Assyrian, and Sumerian. Muhammad Hamidullah (1908–2002), stateless scholar. He knew ten languages and published works in seven of them (Urdu, Persian, English, German, French, Arabic, and Turkish). João Guimarães Rosa (1908–1967), Brazilian novelist. He spoke Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, French, English, German, Esperanto, and some Russian, and could read with the aid of a dictionary Swedish, Dutch, Latin, and Greek. He studied the grammar of a number of other languages, including Sanskrit, Lithuanian, Polish, Czech, Danish, Finnish, Hungarian, Arabic, Hebrew, Japanese, and Tupi. Kató Lomb (1909–2003), Hungarian interpreter. She spoke Hungarian, Russian, German, English, and French, and to a lesser extent Spanish, Italian, Polish, Japanese, and Chinese. She could also translate from Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Ukrainian, Czech, Bulgarian, Romanian, Portuguese, and Latin. Uku Masing (1909–1985), Estonian scholar. He reputedly knew around sixty-five languages.
==== 1910s ==== Hugh Nibley (1910–2005), American scholar. He knew fourteen languages. Lyuba Kutincheva (1910–1998), Bulgarian traveller. She spoke Bulgarian, Russian, Romanian, French, Turkish, Arabic, and Esperanto. Enoch Powell (1912–1998), British politician and classical scholar. He spoke English, German, French, Italian, Modern Greek, and Urdu, and had a reading knowledge of Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, and Welsh. Among classical languages, he knew Ancient Greek, Latin, Hebrew, and Aramaic. George L. Campbell (1912–2004), British linguist. He spoke forty-four languages and had a working knowledge of perhaps twenty others. Meredith Gardner (1912–2002), American linguist and codebreaker. He spoke German, French, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Lithuanian, and Japanese, and could read Latin, Greek, Sanskrit, Old High German, Middle High German, and Old Church Slavonic. Willy Brandt (1913–1992), German politician. He spoke German, English, Norwegian, Swedish, French, and Italian. Toshihiko Izutsu (1914–1993), Japanese scholar. He knew more than thirty languages, including Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, Persian, Sanskrit, Pali, Hindustani, Russian, Greek, and Chinese. Aziz Ahmad (1914–1978), Pakistani novelist. He spoke Urdu, Persian, English, German, French, Italian, Arabic, and Turkish. Charles Berlitz (1914–2003), American publisher and author. He learnt to speak English, German, French, and Spanish as a child, and ultimately came to speak thirty-two languages with varying degrees of fluency. Vernon A. Walters (1917–2002), American soldier and diplomat. He spoke English, Dutch, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Russian. Anthony Burgess (1917–1993), British novelist and composer. He spoke English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Chinese, and Malay. Nabi Bakhsh Baloch (1917–2011), Pakistani scholar. He wrote in Sindhi, Seraiki, Urdu, Balochi, Persian, English, and Arabic. Henryk Szeryng (1918–1988), Polish violinist. He spoke Polish, English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese. Omeljan Pritsak (1919–2006), Ukrainian scholar. He spoke twelve languages. Shūichi Katō (1919–2008), Japanese scholar. He spoke Japanese, Chinese, English, German, French, and Italian. Fazlur Rahman Malik (1919–1988), Pakistani scholar. In addition to his native language, Urdu, he knew Arabic, Persian, English, German, French, Latin, and Ancient Greek.
==== 1920s ==== Pope John Paul II (1920–2005), former leader of the Catholic Church. In addition to his native language, Polish, he knew Latin, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, English, and German. Ahmad Hasan Dani (1920–2009), Pakistani archaeologist. He spoke fifteen languages, including French, Tamil, and Turkish. Alessandro Bausani (1921–1988), Italian scholar. He had a good knowledge of as many as thirty languages, including Persian, Urdu, Arabic, Turkish, Indonesian, and Basque. P. V. Narasimha Rao (1921–2004), Indian politician. He spoke seventeen languages, including English, German, Spanish, and French. Max Mangold (1922–2015), Swiss linguist. He spoke almost forty languages. Christopher Lee (1922–2015), British actor. He spoke English, German, French, Italian, and Spanish, and had some knowledge of Swedish, Russian, and Greek. Michael Ventris (1922–1956), British architect and decipherer of Linear B. By the age of ten, he spoke English, German, Swiss German, French, and Polish. As an adult, he learnt Swedish, Danish, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Modern Greek, and some Turkish. Stephen Wurm (1922–2001), Hungarian-born Australian linguist. "He was a genuine rapid language learner, and before he was 40, was fluent in five of the Germanic languages, five of the Romance languages, three Slavic languages, in Arabic, Swahili, Turkish, Uzbek, Mongol, Mandarin, Tok Pisin, and Police Motu, and could get by in perhaps 30 other languages—over 50 in all." Jambuvijaya (1923–2009), Jain monk. He could read twenty-two languages, including Sanskrit, French, German, and Japanese. Pope Benedict XVI (1927–2022), former leader of the Catholic Church. In addition to his native language, German, he spoke English, Italian, French, Spanish, and Latin, and could read Ancient Greek and Biblical Hebrew. Hans Eberstark (1929–2001), Austrian interpreter. He interpreted into English and German from Dutch, French, Italian, Spanish, and Catalan. He also had some knowledge of Portuguese, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Surinamese Creole, Haitian Creole, Papiamento, Yiddish, several varieties of Swiss German, Albanian, Hebrew, and Amharic.