How to say “truth” in 45 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 Hebrew, where באמת is the 64th most used word.
- Afrikaans waarheid #333
- Arabic حقا truly, verily, in truth #120
- Bengali সত্য truth, reality #292
- Bosnian istina #334
- Bulgarian истина #560
- Catalan veritat #155
- Chinese 真相 actual facts; truth #328
- Croatian istina #327
- Czech pravdu #207
- Danish sandheden #485
- Dutch waarheid #463
- English knew To perceive the truth or factuality of; to be… #288
- Esperanto veron #544
- Estonian tõsi #374
- Finnish totta truth, reality, real thing #131
- French vérité #431
- Galician verdade #135
- Georgian სიმართლე #502
- German eigentlich really, actually, in truth #360
- Hebrew באמת really, in truth #64
- Hindi सच #193
- Hungarian valójában really, in reality, in truth, actually, as a… #463
- Icelandic sannleikur #1,794
- Indonesian bohong not in line with reality and truth; untrue,… #777
- Italian verità #745
- Korean 진실 the truth #1,725
- Latvian patiesībā in truth, in fact, as a matter of fact #359
- Lithuanian tiesą truth, true #260
- Macedonian вистина #315
- Malay adakah Question pronoun used to inquire about the… #84
- Malayalam സത്യം #108
- Norwegian sannheten #531
- Polish prawdę #499
- Portuguese verdade #150
- Romanian adevărul #489
- Serbian istina #332
- Slovak pravdu #151
- Slovenian resnica #421
- Spanish verdad #90
- Swedish sant true; according to the truth #325
- Tagalog katotohanan truth; reality; veracity #427
- Tamil உண்மை truth, fact, reality #271
- Turkish açıkçası frankly, to tell the truth #1,225
- Ukrainian правда #98
- Urdu سچ #176
Knowing the word is the easy half.
Using it with someone who speaks the language is the half that sticks.