How to say “big” in 51 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 Malayalam, where വലിയ is the 50th most used word.
- Afrikaans groot great; big; large #128
- Albanian madh big, large #170
- Arabic كبير big, large #174
- Armenian մեծ big, large #76
- Basque handi big, large #268
- Bengali দাও a kind of big knife #57
- Bosnian sranje A very difficult situation, big trouble #213
- Bulgarian голям big, large #374
- Catalan gran big, large #158
- Chinese 哥哥 elder brother; big brother #196
- Croatian sranje A very difficult situation, big trouble #256
- Czech velký #461
- Dutch grote big, large, great #247
- Esperanto granda big, large #157
- Estonian suur large, big #203
- Finnish iso big, large, great #405
- French grand #267
- Galician tamaño so big #2,008
- Georgian დიდი big, large, great #66
- German große big, large, large-scale #456
- Greek μεγάλη big, large, great #283
- Hebrew גדול big, large #188
- Hindi बड़ा big, large, huge #312
- Hungarian nagy big, great #93
- Icelandic stór #1,470
- Indonesian besar big, large #130
- Italian grandi big, large #833
- Korean 큰 to be big, large #130
- Latvian liels big, large #300
- Lithuanian didelis #395
- Macedonian голема big, large, great #246
- Malay raya great; big #1,147
- Malayalam വലിയ big; large #50
- Norwegian stor large, big, great #267
- Persian بزرگ large, big #140
- Polish duży big, large #1,132
- Portuguese grande large; great; big #173
- Romanian mare big, large, great #122
- Russian большой big, large, great #511
- Serbian sranje A very difficult situation, big trouble #259
- Slovak veľký #264
- Slovenian velik big, large #281
- Spanish señora great big; whopping #299
- Swedish stor big, large; of large size #285
- Tagalog malaki big; large #265
- Tamil பெரிய big, large #84
- Telugu పెద్ద great, big, large #86
- Turkish büyük big, grand, large #78
- Ukrainian великий big, large #437
- Urdu بڑا big, large, huge #168
- Vietnamese bị big sack made from sedge #66
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.