How to say “ball” in 44 languages
Every one of these is a word that turns up in ordinary speech, not a dictionary curiosity — the number beside it is where it ranks in that language.
It is commonest in Hindi, where गोली is the 339th most used word.
- Afrikaans bal A ball #554
- Albanian top #1,067
- Arabic كرة #424
- Basque baloi #1,868
- Bosnian loptu #1,568
- Chinese 打球 to play a ball game #1,852
- Croatian loptu #1,675
- Czech míč #2,173
- Danish kugle #1,725
- Dutch bal to play with a ball #1,042
- English nick A small deflection of the ball off the edge… #1,163
- Esperanto pilkon #1,956
- Estonian kuuli ball, especially a heavy one #1,115
- French balle #821
- German kugel a ball, usually solid #1,742
- Greek μπάλα #1,173
- Hebrew כדור A ball or orb or other spherical object #531
- Hindi गोली #339
- Hungarian golyó #2,269
- Icelandic bolti #1,769
- Indonesian bola ball, a solid or hollow sphere, or roughly… #640
- Italian palle #1,126
- Latvian bumbu #893
- Lithuanian kamuolys clew; a ball of thread #1,852
- Macedonian топка #1,357
- Malay bola #582
- Malayalam പന്ത് #893
- Norwegian ballen #1,826
- Persian توپ #687
- Polish piłkę #2,307
- Portuguese bolas ball, sphere, round object #962
- Romanian bal #2,199
- Russian мяч #2,062
- Serbian loptu #1,544
- Slovak bál #819
- Slovenian krogla #811
- Spanish bola #2,291
- Swedish bollen a ball; a more or less spherical object which… #1,892
- Tagalog bola ball; round object #529
- Tamil பந்து ball, sphere #495
- Telugu బంతి a ball of any kind #409
- Turkish top #1,200
- Urdu گیند #855
- Vietnamese bóng a ball #539
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.