How to say “soul” in 48 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 Serbian, where dušo is the 240th most used word.
- Afrikaans siel #573
- Albanian shpirt soul, spirit #380
- Basque arima #524
- Bengali জান life, soul, being #307
- Bosnian dušo #254
- Bulgarian душа #1,251
- Catalan ànima #987
- Chinese 精神 spirit; soul; will #324
- Croatian dušo #264
- Czech duše #1,142
- Danish sjæl #1,044
- Dutch ziel #1,064
- English spirit The soul of a person or other creature #1,275
- Esperanto animo #565
- Estonian hinge #854
- French âme #973
- Galician alma #767
- German seele #1,048
- Greek ψυχή soul, spirit usually thought to consist of… #917
- Hebrew נפש a soul, psyche #1,606
- Hindi आत्मा soul, spirit, self #757
- Hungarian lélek #2,474
- Icelandic sál a soul #812
- Indonesian jiwa #806
- Italian anima #1,110
- Korean 영혼 #1,909
- Latvian dvēsele #1,488
- Lithuanian siela soul, spirit #1,057
- Macedonian душа #838
- Malay jiwa #782
- Malayalam ആത്മാവ് #632
- Norwegian sjel #1,421
- Persian جان soul; life; life-force #269
- Polish duszę soul, spirit #2,255
- Portuguese alma #997
- Romanian sufletul soul, spirit #1,022
- Serbian dušo #240
- Slovak dušu #761
- Slovenian duša #741
- Spanish alma #937
- Swedish själ #1,122
- Tagalog kaluluwa soul; spirit; essence #1,286
- Tamil உயிர் life, soul #472
- Telugu ఆత్మ #423
- Turkish can soul, life, being #974
- Ukrainian душа soul, spirit #1,688
- Urdu روح soul, spirit #1,301
- Vietnamese vong departed soul or spirit #1,742
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.