How Similar Are ROMANIAN and ITALIAN?

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  • Опубликовано: 21 янв 2025

Комментарии • 4,5 тыс.

  • @TaciturnusIneffabilis
    @TaciturnusIneffabilis 2 года назад +5221

    i am a native romanian speaker. this summer i visited italy and at a caffee me and my friends struck a conversation with an older italian guy and we were all surprised to realise that we didn’t need a translator. we spoke romanian and the guy spoke italian and we had no trouble understanding each other. if i realised that he might not have understood a romanian word that I said I would just use a synonym and most of the time he would catch that. he also did the same. we chatted almost 3 hours and even managed to touch some more complex subjects like art and the military discipline. it was really an unforgettable experience. shows you how similar these 2 languages really are.

    • @davidsturm7706
      @davidsturm7706 2 года назад +332

      What part of Italy were you in? The wide variety of Italian dialects makes me guess you might have been near Venezio or Triesti

    • @TaciturnusIneffabilis
      @TaciturnusIneffabilis 2 года назад +394

      @@davidsturm7706 yes, that was in a small town somewhere around Venice

    • @jamesz9635
      @jamesz9635 2 года назад +177

      i love hearing these types of stories, thanks for sharing!

    • @koantao8321
      @koantao8321 2 года назад +160

      I recognise many Romanian words through the Tosco-Romagnolo (San Marino area) dialect my grandmother spoke.

    • @iblame_darian
      @iblame_darian 2 года назад +186

      @roffin9942 Nah, it's quite easy for Romanians to understand Italian and vice versa. Same for Spanish and Italian

  • @yanchoho
    @yanchoho 2 года назад +733

    I've never listened to Romanian before and I didn't realize what a beautifully sounding language it is.

    • @AlexandruG09
      @AlexandruG09 2 года назад +26

      try listening to carla's dreams

    • @ciprianmoldovanu6264
      @ciprianmoldovanu6264 2 года назад +5

      Check out the music...

    • @Nina_user
      @Nina_user 2 года назад +15

      Really? Thank you, I always wondered how it sounds for a foreigner.

    • @costealucia5357
      @costealucia5357 Год назад +11

      @@AlexandruG09 From all the good things that country has to offer you advice him to listen to Carla's bs?Is a Moldovian band, even if Moldovans speak a dialect of romanian language, that doesn't mean that they belong to Romania these days.

    • @costealucia5357
      @costealucia5357 Год назад +5

      @@Nina_user Unfortunately, all the young people these days behave as their country is an ex colonial land, romglish sucks, so do those that use it.

  • @TheGamalore
    @TheGamalore 2 года назад +483

    I'm American but have been living in Romania for over a year with my wife. During that time I have learned Romanian quite well and can read to what I would say is a fluent level. I recently met an Italian guy in Bucharest, and upon hearing him speak Italian, I was extremely surprised when I could pick out enough words in his sentence to get the general idea of what was being said.

    • @mcm80123456
      @mcm80123456 2 года назад +26

      ...so learning Romanian actually you understand today Italian and don't be surprised if you understand also Spanish and Portuguese.

    • @TheGamalore
      @TheGamalore 2 года назад +16

      @@mcm80123456 well growing up in Texas I was surrounded by Spanish and was forced to take it for years in school, so that one wasn't so bad. Can't understand Portugese from Portugal that's for sure, maybe Brazilian Portugese 🤣

    • @healththenopulence5106
      @healththenopulence5106 2 года назад +12

      @Marcella Tondi Ro has a more complex vocab than italian, in which same word has different versions but each word has a latin version
      Basically we had to learn other peoples words and they also got romanianized and kept some foreign words
      But if a romanian pays attention to speak with the latin versions, you understand 100% can even hold lectures
      However in to us romanians, italian sounds soo wodden language because we have words which make more sense rather than use 'finito' when to stop.. we use 'termina-te'
      Also although we both have 80%+ latin words we take words from latin which you dont have for example 'incepere' to begin.. and its straight from latin
      We're 2000km away and 2000years disconnected but with careful word choice you will get rokanian.. just ask them to use another synonim for the word which you dont understand

    • @leobraila
      @leobraila Год назад +1

      @@healththenopulence5106 We also have purely latin words but whose meaning has changed, that are not found in Italian language. Go! meaning Andare- italian; Mergi- Romanian; mergere-latin.

    • @carron979
      @carron979 Год назад +1

      @@MrCrish81 cut the diacritics and you will find another "pure latin" word: "intelegi"...

  • @Arturexiusz
    @Arturexiusz 2 года назад +218

    I'm Polish. Never took classes in neither of these, but I know a word or two in both and I can discern Italian from other Roman languages. Once, I was watching a YT video on some car parts replacement. I was convinced it was in Italian to the moment I saw the license plate that said RO for Romania, and not IT for Italy. That's how similar they are to me :D!

    • @euyo-lm7rf
      @euyo-lm7rf Год назад

      romanian has slavic influences too , a polish friend said that we don't have as many "z" "tz" ...as your language but more than italian ..and some words are the same maybe with slightly diff meaning...vaca in romanian is cow, curva means whore...😁

    • @EminBastea
      @EminBastea Год назад +7

      as a romanian, i think the romanian spoken in Moldova region, sounds phonetically like mixing italian with Polish language

    • @sleepyjohn2695
      @sleepyjohn2695 Год назад +6

      "Kurwa" sounds and means the same in Romanian:)))), just they write it differently:)))

    • @Gelu345
      @Gelu345 6 месяцев назад

      @@EminBastea You are illiterate!😄😄😄

    • @wilsonbarbosa4683
      @wilsonbarbosa4683 4 месяца назад

      Realmente pode acontecer,pessoas não conhecem os idiomas românticos pode se confundir.por exemplo alguém ouvindo português acha que é o francês,espanhol ou italiano.

  • @Student-cs2ws
    @Student-cs2ws 2 года назад +1335

    As a germanically biased speakers, romance languages like Romanian and Italian are damn hard for us Dutch to get our head around. However since my parents are true Italy-addicts, I consider myself to have been lucky getting exposed to the sound of Italian in a very intense way, spending time in Italy with Italian friends. Back home I did some Latin and French at school. Și atunci în anul 2013 s-a întâmplat ceva incredibil în viața mea, după m-am înregistrat pentru o călătorie spre România în cadrul unui program de schimb, pe care a avut loc între doi școli care au vrut să schimb elevele iei pentru a face contact cu culturi alți. Dar puțin după momentul pe care am sosit, am auzit că limba Română n-a fost deloc o limbă slavică. A fost o limbă așa de asemănătoare cu acestui sunet pe care am auzit deja când am fost în vizită în Italia cu părinții mei. În anul 2013/2014 m-am îndrăgostit cu țara acestea. Fiecare an când am timp să vizitez România, pot să văd că România este o cea mai frumoasa țară pe care am văzut în viața mea… foarte plin de viața. Și acum în 2022, după am privit pe toatele filme animate al copiilor de pe Disney+ în limba Română (pentru că e mai ușor pentru noi), o problemă mică s-apărut dacă sunt în vacanța în Italia cu părinți mei. Dacă încerc să vorbesc limba Italiană cu multe de semne de mână… mintea mea vrea să încă mai vorbește limba Română. Chiar nu pot să opresc.

    • @ionconstantinbufanu
      @ionconstantinbufanu 2 года назад +104

      Multumesc foarte dragut din partea ta sa impartasesti experienta ta . Sarbatori fericite

    • @GabrielaLtc
      @GabrielaLtc 2 года назад +44

      Thanks for sharing your experience. Mulțumesc! 🙂

    • @strobo24
      @strobo24 2 года назад +28

      Nice one! Have you seen the "Delta Dunarii"?

    • @romaniaplus
      @romaniaplus 2 года назад +52

      Esti o minune de om! Sunt bucuros sa intalnesc oameni ca tine! Sanatate si numai bucurii!

    • @florinadrian5174
      @florinadrian5174 2 года назад +37

      Amazing story.
      As a Romanian who never took lessons of either, I have the same difficulty when trying to speak Spanish: Italian words come out.

  • @stef1866
    @stef1866 2 года назад +621

    Interesting fact, I am Romanian. My great-grandfather fought in WW1 in the Austria-Hungarian army, being from Transylvania, which was part of the dual monarchy at that time. Romania proper fought alongside the triple entante. He was on the Italian front and was caught by Italian army. He said "sunt român!" The Italians responded with "fratello romeno!" He was a prisoner of war and came back with a love of Italy:)

    • @andreraphael6727
      @andreraphael6727 2 года назад +99

      Thanks. This is one of the most touching stories I have ever heard. Saluti e un abbraccio ai fratelli romeni dall'italia.

    • @dylan-pl9lh
      @dylan-pl9lh 2 года назад +12

      wow..

    • @furybrown3856
      @furybrown3856 2 года назад +29

      I got goose bumps from that story ...damn

    • @katherineamelia98
      @katherineamelia98 2 года назад +19

      that is so cute

    • @michelecagnetta4012
      @michelecagnetta4012 2 года назад +29

      E' una storia bellissima.

  • @nourmajzoub8328
    @nourmajzoub8328 2 года назад +252

    I'm lebanese and l learned medicine in romania. I traveled 2 times in Italy,and I didnt have any difficulty understanding the italian language while speaking with the italians ,it was a good experience.

  • @lalalili4197
    @lalalili4197 Год назад +189

    Im nor Italian or Romanian.
    Just french.
    I barely write comments on youtube, but i've watched most of ur videos, and I want to thank you, because there are so precise and true. The amount of researches u had to do to make them is incredible. Thank you for sharing it, and thank you for this channel.
    Paul, respect !

    • @maxwellgarrison2983
      @maxwellgarrison2983 Год назад +1

      Comment bien pouvez-vous comprendre le romanien? Je pense que j'ai reçu 80%.

    • @grassytramtracks
      @grassytramtracks Год назад +2

      ​@@maxwellgarrison2983je parle anglais et français comme langue maternelle et italien comme L2, et je l'ai trouvé facile à comprendre le romanien

    • @maxwellgarrison2983
      @maxwellgarrison2983 Год назад +1

      @@grassytramtracks C'est très intéressant, non? haha

    • @ricnyc2759
      @ricnyc2759 Год назад +1

      Paul works hard. He deserves the millions of followers he has on RUclips.

    • @pacofalcini341
      @pacofalcini341 Год назад

      Romanien mdrr

  • @dracular22
    @dracular22 2 года назад +639

    For Romanians is far easier to understand Italian and i think that is because for every Italian word there is a synonym in Romanian that is very close but not the other way around, also we use words in a different context.
    Ex #1 : in Romanian "mare" means "sea" but also "big" (because the sea is big), we have also grand, grandios but is almost never used in day to day conversations, following this logic we can understand Italian when they make sentences with "grande" but for them is very strange and out of context the word mare (sea) in the same sentence in Romanian.
    Ex #2: For "cave" we have three words meaning the same thing: "pestera", "grota", "caverna", but 90% of the time the word "pestera" is used, in italian there is only: "grotta" and "caverna". This means that an Italian have no clue what is "pestera" but a Romanian can understand very well "grotta" and "caverna". A lot of the words are constantly falling in and out of fashion and this may repeat during centuries as it happened always, maybe in 100 years from now the new Romanian hipsters will like "caverna" more :D.

    • @Vlad-uk7ty
      @Vlad-uk7ty 2 года назад +20

      We got slavic and otoman influences in our history therefore it's more difficult for them to understand romanian language. Most likely, "mare" and "pestera" are borrowed from slavic or otoman languages.

    • @Kinotaurus
      @Kinotaurus 2 года назад +29

      @@Vlad-uk7ty "Pestera" is definitely derived from Slavic "peschera" (cave). "Mare" probably not, as slavic "more" (cognate of Latin "mare") also means "sea". "VladimirAr" is probably right on the etimology of "mare", especially since the proto-Romanians mostly lived inland so for them the sea would indeed be something not encountered in everyday life and therefore would be awe-inspiring with its size.

    • @maxavail
      @maxavail 2 года назад +40

      How about "amore", which in Romanian is "amor", but never used except in poetry, since in daily speech we use Slavic derived words such as "iubire" or "dragoste" ?

    • @HeroManNick132
      @HeroManNick132 2 года назад +6

      @@Kinotaurus In most Slavic languages cave is pronounced as "peshtera" more specifically Bulgarian. There were some Aegian dialects in Greece that people who speak Bulgarian use "Shch" instead of "Sht."

    • @Lucian86
      @Lucian86 2 года назад +2

      Thanks... always wondered why

  • @KrodinoPOOPS
    @KrodinoPOOPS 2 года назад +1884

    Greetings to all Romanian brothers from Italy
    🇮🇹🤝🏼🇷🇴

    • @Matt-cw1mv
      @Matt-cw1mv 2 года назад +43

      Ciao Bella 🤌🤌🤌🤌 mafia spaghetti 🤌🤌🤌 mama Mia

    • @razvanbarascu4007
      @razvanbarascu4007 2 года назад +72

      Salutari, fratele nostru!🥃🥃

    • @Beksultan9
      @Beksultan9 2 года назад +47

      🇪🇸 Hola mi amigos de España

    • @solbandtulcea1750
      @solbandtulcea1750 2 года назад +52

      Salutari la frații noștrii latini Italieni. 🇷🇴🇮🇹 Romania=ROMA

    • @cristi8183
      @cristi8183 2 года назад +23

      Salut! 🍻 Fratele nostru!

  • @andrewcapran1101
    @andrewcapran1101 2 года назад +329

    My parents are romanian immigrants. I was born in America but I was taught romanian by my parents since I was little. Growing up in the US, I learned Spanish in school. Having these 3 languages in my brain can allow me to understand Italian almost perfectly

    • @costealucia5357
      @costealucia5357 Год назад +12

      Try also portuguese, you will be amazed to understand that as well;).

    • @carron979
      @carron979 Год назад +31

      French instead of Spanish also does the job, but yet again: with Romanian only one can speak fluent Italian in less than a week.
      I remember the 90's when Romanian football players were transfered to Italian teams for the 1st time and they were giving interviews in Italian days after their arrival... The Italian press was under the impression that they come from the land of geniuses :-))))

    • @JiwonAstrid
      @JiwonAstrid Год назад +9

      oh wow I also have an American friend who has Romanian parents and she learned Spanish too!

    • @kristinerumpel
      @kristinerumpel Год назад +6

      my story is exactly like yours

    • @norielsylvire4516
      @norielsylvire4516 Год назад +3

      Same here, only I went to Spain and learned English at school.
      It's stupidly easy to understand Italian 😊

  • @MarioLucianAndreano
    @MarioLucianAndreano 2 года назад +145

    I am native in both and this is the first time I find a video that fully gets it! Too many times people tend to discredit some Romanian words saying they are not Latin, but if you deep dive you find that they simply evolved differently or come from another closely related word. Excellent video!

    • @m.dewylde5287
      @m.dewylde5287 Год назад +13

      Yes! I am Romanian and I am fluent in Italian. I used to think the same. If a Romanian word was very different in Italian, I used to think that is because it must be of Slavic origin, or Greek, Turkish, Hungarian or German. I am still surprised to find out that many words in Romanian are actually much closer to classic Latin than their Italian versions. As a matter of fact, linguists say that Romanian language is the closest to Latin than all the other Romance languages.

    • @XxDINOxFROSTxX
      @XxDINOxFROSTxX Год назад +12

      Romanian is more closer to old latin than Italian

  • @mike42356
    @mike42356 2 года назад +137

    The Romanian "Dumneavoastră", written capitalized, the polite form of "you", comes from "Domnia Voastră", which means "Your Highness" - literally "your rulership", in plural form.

    • @spawn90336
      @spawn90336 Год назад +31

      in Latin: dominatio vestra

    • @bloodbonnieking
      @bloodbonnieking 5 месяцев назад +5

      we really need to add accents again because i managed to spell domnia voastă really wrong lmao because it's pronunced domnía but i did not stress the i

    • @maxavail
      @maxavail Месяц назад +2

      Dumneavoastra = Domnia Voastra = Your Lordship

  • @MrPrivits
    @MrPrivits 2 года назад +311

    As an Italian who learnt some Romanian, I would say that, unlike when I speak English, I can think in Italian and directly translate my thoughts in Romanian. This makes learning and speaking the language a lot easier. I also believe that studying Latin at school has definitely helped. For example, "to understand" ("capire", in Italian, which comes from Latin "capere", which means "to get", "to catch") in Romanian is "a înțelege", that directly comes from the Latin verb "intelligere" with the same meaning which also produces intelligent, intelligente and inteligent in English, Italian and Romanian respectively.

    • @amjan
      @amjan 2 года назад +14

      The thinking aspect is universal for all language families. I'm Polish and can think Polish when speaking other Slavic langauges, like Czech, Russian or Croatian.

    • @razvanbarascu4007
      @razvanbarascu4007 2 года назад +30

      @@amjan yes, for sure. But I guess he was trying to say he just picks up the cognate word in romanian straight after having the italian thought.
      When I was tired and speaking in english with brits in the UK, the first word I was thinking about to translate my thoughts was the cognate word in english of the romanian one. The brits were like, 'fckin hell mate, where r u pulling this academia words from?'😂😂

    • @FreedomAlternative
      @FreedomAlternative 2 года назад +9

      That's my biggest problem every time I visit Italy in the first 24 hours.
      Generally, I think in English when I speak Swedish or Russian. But with Italian I have to remind myself that thinking it through in Romanian definitely improves my speech by a lot.

    • @tuluppampam
      @tuluppampam 2 года назад +3

      Little reminder that intelligere is, technically speaking, a valid Italian word (absolutely never used, but it doesn't matter as anyone would understand it thanks to the word intelligibile)

    • @carron979
      @carron979 2 года назад +15

      Once, our French forensic psychiatry teacher asked: "Do you know where the term "constringere" comes from?" (He wanted to impress us, of course...)
      So instead of answering "Latin" I asked: "Does it have a "circonflex accent" on the "i"?"
      "No", he replied...
      "Then it's not Romanian..." 🙂🙂

  • @TheSpeedsters86
    @TheSpeedsters86 2 года назад +403

    Long live the friendship of the Romance languages!🇷🇴🇮🇹🇪🇸🇵🇹🇫🇷 🇪🇺

    • @alexeyusa6274
      @alexeyusa6274 Год назад +5

      You forget one flag 😢

    • @liviuorehovschi5287
      @liviuorehovschi5287 Год назад +3

      @@alexeyusa6274 which one?

    • @Gaff07
      @Gaff07 Год назад +3

      ​@@alexeyusa6274 which one?

    • @Theconfused_one.
      @Theconfused_one. Год назад +2

      Totally agreed!❤

    • @Theconfused_one.
      @Theconfused_one. Год назад +5

      ​@@alexeyusa6274 wait.....there are:
      French
      Italian
      Spanish
      Romanian
      Portuguese
      Nope there is everyone😐

  • @RaffaelePatin
    @RaffaelePatin 2 года назад +733

    As an italian, I understood ~60% of the audio and 80/90% of the written language.
    Some words like dumneavoastra are very interesting, if you studied some latin you could probably relate It to other italian words probably unused

    • @PopescuSorin
      @PopescuSorin 2 года назад +77

      dumneavostra = domnia voastra. dumneata = domnia ta, dumneaei = domnia ei. dumnealor = domnia lor

    • @alin1553
      @alin1553 2 года назад +132

      Yes, you are right! Dumneavoastră is an compound word "Domnia Voastră". Already become more intelligible, isn't it? "Domnia" comes from latin "Domini" and "Voastră" comes from latin "Vostro", so means Domini Vostro addressed to a respected person.
      Similar is "Mulțumesc" which comes from "Multa et milia" which means "a lot and thousands". Comparing with Italian language, you have "grazie mille". So, is something similar. If we had said "Mulțumesc grațios" then it would be 95% similar with "grazie mille".

    • @RaffaelePatin
      @RaffaelePatin 2 года назад +70

      @@alin1553 something like dumneavoastra in italian could be "vossignoria", abbreviation of "vostra" and "signoria".
      "Vostra" means yours, as in romanian.
      "Signoria" Is related to "signore" that comes from the latin word "senior", which means "older" but in italian assumed the meaning of "lord".
      So in this case "signoria" Is like "eccellenza" or "maestà".

    • @wyqtor
      @wyqtor 2 года назад +28

      @@RaffaelePatin Or 'vostra merced' -> USTED in Spanish, which has the exact same meaning!

    • @Zullyan
      @Zullyan 2 года назад +25

      Yes, when we are being polite with one another we call each other "Your Lordship" basically.

  • @Indigoqueer
    @Indigoqueer 2 года назад +306

    As a Spanish and Italian speaker I always wondered where the past tense forms of ser/essere came from! It is kind of cool that while we chose one half of the verb, the Romanians chose the other. Neat!

    • @fedcard
      @fedcard 2 года назад +10

      Look for the video of Linguriosa "Por qué tenemos SER y ESTAR?" She explains it.

    • @alexandru59139
      @alexandru59139 2 года назад +6

      Las calles de idiomas son muy complicadas, jaja! ¡Saludos desde Rumania!

    • @tuluppampam
      @tuluppampam 2 года назад +2

      I think it's got something to do with another Latin verb, fio, which means a lot of different things (it was very used in Latin) like to become, to be elected, to be caused (as in to be made existing, though I've probably worded it wrongly)
      It is very similar to the past forms of the verb sum in Latin
      Though this is my analysis with very little knowledge of linguistics and some knowledge of Latin

    • @UlpianHeritor
      @UlpianHeritor 2 года назад +5

      @@tuluppampam I think you are right. In Romanian, the past tense of Latin essere (fio) became the present tense (a fi) while in Spanish they are inherited in the past tense (fue). Romanian also inherited this in the past tense “fost” (was in English).
      “A fi” (to be) also spawned some interesting words that only developed in eastern romance, such as “ființa” or “being” as in “ființa umană” (human being)

    • @bradu.x
      @bradu.x 2 года назад

      @@alexandru59139 ¡Saludos!

  • @angheloiumarius
    @angheloiumarius Год назад +73

    That's why a very large community of Romanians now live in Italia.
    It's almost easy to make the transition from one language to other in maximum 2 months.
    Salutări tuturor românilor & Ciao a tutti :)

  • @science_around_the_clock
    @science_around_the_clock 2 года назад +463

    I am Italian native-speaker, and I am learning Romanian. I also had the impression that it is easier for Romanians to understand Italian than the other way around. I guess that’s because Romanians can easily get the meaning of Latin-derived Italian words (at least when a similar word exists in Romanian as well), but for Italians there is no way of understanding a Romanian word that does not derive from Latin. For example, a Romanian will highly likely understand the meaning of the Italian word “supportare” (to support), since they have at least two synonyms for the noun “support”, namely “suport” and “sprijin”. However, there is no way an Italian will understand the meaning of the word “sprijin”, as we have no other similar word in our language.
    Moreover, I must note that having studied Latin at school probably helped me learn Romanian.

    • @sebastian.tristan
      @sebastian.tristan 2 года назад +17

      Interesting point. But the same can be said of Romanians who can have difficulties when hearing Italian words of Germanic origins (guardare, bianco, etc). I think that the reasons Romanians understand Italian better is a) because Italian is a popular language and b) a lot of Italian words are similar to French and Spanish (all having Latin and Germanic influences) and all popular languages.

    • @BananLord
      @BananLord 2 года назад +15

      @@sebastian.tristan we do have the word "gardă" which means guard (gardă de corp = bodyguard) and instead of saying "stai de pază" you can say "stai de gardă" (keep watch). We also use "gardian/eni" in legal documents to refer to who is responsible for a child (parents, adoptive parents or other relatives). We have very few germanic words, even tho we had germanic villages in Romania.

    • @sebastian.tristan
      @sebastian.tristan 2 года назад +4

      @@BananLord Both of those words are of Frankish (Germanic) origins and were incorporated into Romanian through the relatively recent French influence.

    • @camelianedelcu5640
      @camelianedelcu5640 2 года назад +32

      Noi rumeni siamo un popolo molto ricettivo alle lingue straniere,io ho 74 anni ,pensate che io quando ho finito il liceo (nel 1966) avevo studiato per 7 anni russo,poi per 4 anni ,latino,francese e fuori corso 1 anno di inglese. Ecco perché quando sono stata a Mosca in visita ho potuto leggere in cirillico, il dialetto veneto dove vivo da 44 anni non mi ha creato nessuna difficoltà, è veramente anche la lingua spagnola la capivo quando ho fatto il giro della Spagna.

    • @BananLord
      @BananLord 2 года назад +11

      A thing I forgot to mention: "suport" is not a direct synonym of "sprijin" when it come to let's say giving emotional support to someone or cheering someone on bcs saying to someone "te suport" comes around as "you're a bearable person to be around". "Nu suport" means "I can't handle/can't stand to/don't like" and "Nu te (mai) suport/esti insuportabil" is said to someone as in like (not a direct translation to the 1st) "you're insufferable", in a softer way. Recently, with more Rom-English speakers, it is incorporated to mean the same thing as "supporting someone", but it still sounds weird as it isn't used as that in Romanian. But still, the football fans are called "suporteri".

  • @gigihentz5510
    @gigihentz5510 2 года назад +157

    when visited Italy some years ago, a shop advertisment struck me..."camicia con maneca longa" which means "camasa cu maneca lunga" in Romanian :):)

    • @pierreabbat6157
      @pierreabbat6157 2 года назад +5

      I recognize "camicia" as "camisa/chemise", but "camasa" out of context I'd think was the camas plant or something else.

    • @MKnew099
      @MKnew099 2 года назад +20

      Just for the sake of accuracy, it should be spelled "camicia con manica lunga", however, "camicia a maniche lunghe" is more common.

    • @Henrique-iy2lk
      @Henrique-iy2lk 2 года назад +26

      As a portuguese speaker, I understood both sentences completely. In portuguese, it would be "camisa com manga longa"

    • @zaqwsx23
      @zaqwsx23 2 года назад +10

      To be precise, in Italian it would be "camicia con manica lunga".

    • @Bunny-kp1zd
      @Bunny-kp1zd 2 года назад +12

      @@Henrique-iy2lk sardo: camisa a màniga longa
      Italiano: camicia a manica lunga

  • @subkontrabasklarinet
    @subkontrabasklarinet 2 года назад +85

    I'm a huge lover of Romania and the Romanian language, so I take this video as a premature Christmas gift. Mulțumesc, Paule!

    • @LearnRomanianWithCorina
      @LearnRomanianWithCorina 2 года назад +3

      If you want more Christmas gifts, I'm here :P

    • @mojewjewjew4420
      @mojewjewjew4420 2 года назад

      Where are you from?

    • @ItsMikeLearns
      @ItsMikeLearns 2 года назад

      @@LearnRomanianWithCorina i love the channel :)

    • @dragosarsene8333
      @dragosarsene8333 Год назад +1

      Hey just a tip, the 'e' ending in Paule can be used to express the vocative case, but can be considered rude when used in combination with a name.

  • @timoteitodor2868
    @timoteitodor2868 Год назад +9

    It's the first time I have contact with your channel.
    Hats off for the ammount of research and precision put in to this video. I saw a few similar ones before with many mistakes and assumptions.
    This is truly an educational material.

  • @SanttUy
    @SanttUy 2 года назад +97

    I am from Uruguay, hence my native language is Spanish. However, I speak Italian fluently. I’m at the moment learning Romanian on Duolingo and I have to admit Italian is helping me a lot, much more that Spanish or Portuguese.
    Thanks for the video, it was very interesting and educative. 😊

    • @auralplex
      @auralplex Год назад

      That lady on duo lingo is the devil

    • @dhanyrafael
      @dhanyrafael Год назад +2

      And I am a Romanian learning Spanish... It's so easy to learn it. I am listening daily to predicas Christiana and I understand almost all the words. 😃👌
      I am watching football matches with Portuguese commentary and I am amazed that Portuguese is closer to Romanian than Spanish. Strange. 😃👌

    • @HotaruDS
      @HotaruDS Год назад +1

      ❤😊

  • @Henritar
    @Henritar 2 года назад +21

    This video just made me want to return to my romanian studies. As a brazilian portuguese, italian a (a little of) french speaker, romanian has always caught my attention. Love your videos!!

    • @crimom
      @crimom 2 года назад +2

      (PT)
      Nesta casa com um litro de vinho e um kilo de carne de vaca nao se more de fome ou de sede.
      (RO)
      In aceasta casa cu un litru de vin si un kil de carne de vaca nu se moare de foame ori de sete. 😊

  • @lellab.8179
    @lellab.8179 2 года назад +171

    I'm Italian and, despite a lot of Romanian people living in my city, I've neved heard the Romanian language. I have to say that listening to it for the first time, I could understand about 70% of it.
    I've never studied latin, but about "Dumneavoastra" I immediately recognized it as a form of courtesy, a bit as "Vossignoria" (not very much used, nowadays).
    About "Ai fost", I thought of Italian "passato remoto" (remote past) of "essere" (to be) which is "(tu) fosti" (or "trapassato remoto": (tu) fosti stato).
    About "unde", we have a word coming from the same latin one: "onde", meaning "from where", a bit archaic but very much used in not so ancient literature.
    A very interesting comparison video, as always. I was really surprised how much Romanian I could understand.

    • @pokeshark
      @pokeshark 2 года назад +25

      "Dumneavoastra" is the joint form of "domnia voastra" (in Latin something like "dominus voster").

    • @carron979
      @carron979 2 года назад +6

      in Romanian the "passato remoto" is no more considered literar, but a regionalism specific to the Oltenia region. It has a funny conotation when used in day to day conversation, but still in novels one can encounter a lot of it like in any other neolatin languages...

    • @elaela2754
      @elaela2754 2 года назад +5

      @@pokeshark or like "Your Highness" in English

    • @maddahy
      @maddahy 2 года назад +6

      "Dumneavoastra" means exactly the same thing as "Vossignoria", not only in sense, they are direct reciprocal literal translations, even if split into components.

    • @ralucancf
      @ralucancf 2 года назад +6

      @@elaela2754 "Your Higness" in romanian would be "Alteța Voastră" and it is normally used (same as in English) when addressing some of the royal family members (ex: prices). "Dumneavoastră" comes from "Domnia voastră " wich in English is "Your Lordship".

  • @mytube001
    @mytube001 2 года назад +91

    As a Swedish speaker, these two seem about as close to each other as Danish and Swedish in their modern forms. Most words are the same or very similar, but with different spellings and pronunciations. Some words have the same origin, but now mean different things, which can trip you up. And then a number of words with different origins, loans, that you just have to learn. Some differences in grammar and pronunciation on top of that.

    • @AxyDavid
      @AxyDavid Год назад +3

      I speak both swedish and danish, alongside romanian. I would say danish and swedish are more closely related to each other vocabulary wise. However on the written part.... I'd say they're comparable to italian/romanian combination.

    • @Meridianux
      @Meridianux Год назад +1

      @@AxyDavid Probabil se refera cum se aud sunetele! Fonetic, iti da impresia ca toate cuvintele, sunt similare! Bine ca limba romana, pare ca e o italiana cu accent portughez!

  • @VicenteChenHolaatodos
    @VicenteChenHolaatodos 2 года назад +132

    I’m from East Asia, but have been learning Italian for nine months. It’s cool to see myself understanding 95% the first shown 15 seconds in Italian, and about Romanian, it was even more shocking seeing myself can get around 80% of its meanings.
    Yes, I understand the roots of its language family. It’s just soooo interesting to find out that I myself can get what people say even if I haven’t learned their language. So,proud of myself learning this magical language😊

    • @silviuvelovici8307
      @silviuvelovici8307 2 года назад +8

      Keep up the good work!

    • @alexsamu9787
      @alexsamu9787 Год назад +2

      Lol u learn 2 languages at once 🤣

    • @StrawberryMilkkTeaa
      @StrawberryMilkkTeaa Год назад

      Why do you say East Asia, that’s a region in the continent of Asia with more than a single country, lol. What is the reason for this? Is it embarrassing for you to say China?

    • @euyo-lm7rf
      @euyo-lm7rf Год назад

      @@StrawberryMilkkTeaa maybe he is aware of prejudice ...seems he was right 😁

    • @carron979
      @carron979 Год назад +1

      It's obvious you are a polyglot and polyglots make connections faster than average people...

  • @mihuionut3721
    @mihuionut3721 2 года назад +326

    I am Romanian and don't know Italian, but if i read it, I understand about 85% from it

    • @AntonioBarba_TheKaneB
      @AntonioBarba_TheKaneB 2 года назад +34

      I think you guys understand Italian as easily as we Italians understand Spanish. That's a weird relationship but many people that I've spoken too (romanian and spanish speakers) tend to agree.

    • @AniRayn
      @AniRayn 2 года назад +12

      Presupun ca te referi la 85% din propozitii/mesaje (nu cuvinte), iar aici treaba depinde foarte mult de context. Cand zici ca ai inteles o propozitie, te referi ca ai prins ideea principala, chiar daca nu cunosti unele cuvinte si iti scapa chestiile subtile, nuantate. Si oricum 85% doar pare mult, pana citesti un text unde 15% cuvinte sunt gibberish. Daca acele 15% sunt cuvinte importante, atunci nu poti sa zici ca ai inteles nici jumatate din text.

    • @balkanwitch5747
      @balkanwitch5747 2 года назад +1

      I can understand the general idea, but I can't understand anything, especially when native speakers talk in Italian... just gibberish that sounds vaguely like Romanian

    • @balkanwitch5747
      @balkanwitch5747 2 года назад

      @@AniRayn exact

    • @re_di_roma_is_back2388
      @re_di_roma_is_back2388 2 года назад +5

      Secondo me dipende dal fatto che siamo poco esposti al rumeno, mentre siamo molto esposti al francese e allo spagnolo (di Spagna e d'Argentina) e anche al portoghese soprattutto il portoghese parlato in Brasile

  • @Frilouz79
    @Frilouz79 2 года назад +99

    I am French, and I have worked with Romanian companies. I remember once, during a company visit, a Romanian technician had to explain to me how a machine worked. He only spoke Romanian, and someone was translating into English for me. After a few sentences, I told him to stop translating, because I understood what the technician was saying. This is because he was using a lot of international technical terms. In the same way, I could understand some of the news on TV in the hotel because I knew what the speaker was talking about and the political words he was using are international.

    • @kallucelfrumos4946
      @kallucelfrumos4946 Год назад +1

      very similar to esperando ?

    • @joangg
      @joangg Год назад +6

      So, maybe, somehow, the deep Latin base of both French and Romenian plus technical vocabulary connected you in a way a stranger language didn't

    • @AlexAlex-jk6uq
      @AlexAlex-jk6uq Год назад +12

      @@joangg , yeah, but we have 22.18% of words in our romanian vocabulary borrowed DIRECTLY from french...:) Plus, in interwar period french was very popular among nobility in Romania... They say every second nobelman knew french by that time :)

    • @Don_Puparo
      @Don_Puparo Год назад +2

      @@kallucelfrumos4946 esperanto! also... esperanto was artificially created by mixing all european languages.late 1800's if I remember well, by a Russian guy.

    • @kallucelfrumos4946
      @kallucelfrumos4946 Год назад

      @@Don_Puparo not a ucrainean? Slava ucraina!

  • @ilrompiballe6187
    @ilrompiballe6187 2 года назад +18

    Italian speaker here!
    I heard very few conversations in Romanian, and maybe was for the accent or the use of some non Latin words, but I never understood the context of the speakers.
    But watching your video it was much easier to understand both in writing and listening forms, enough for me to think that if I could live some weeks or months I can actually learn it very fast and become fluent with a daily exposure.

  • @Bigflorent
    @Bigflorent 2 года назад +66

    I'm italian and I can say this, Romanian is easily understandable for us if we know well italian. I mean, Romanian seems to use a different logic, for example, in that sentence it was used "foṣti" if I remember correctly and "sono stato", but fosti is the remote past of essere, which means "I was (long time ago)", so if you enlarge your italian vocabulary, it begins to be easier to understand. Most examples are words that we have but use in different cases, like past present and future or simply situations

    • @Cipricus
      @Cipricus 2 года назад +14

      ”if you enlarge your italian vocabulary” < also, if you know more Italian dialects. What Romanian Latin words I cannot find in Italian or other standard Romance languages I usually find in Sardinian, Sicilian, Neapolitan, Corsican, etc, even full phrases.

    • @ramonac5600
      @ramonac5600 Год назад +7

      And viceversa. I saw a lot of comments that said if you speak slowly Italian and romanian you will understand each other. That slowly speaking allows you think what could be the meaning of an familiar world that you use it in a different sentence. I saw the guy said something about "capire" and in romanian "a intelege". Well it doesn't sound the same but "cap" means "head" in Ro. Some can figure it out from the start (because we also have an expression "foloseste-ti capul" that means "use your head" like "use your brain", and from the context you can figure it out that it can be "to understand") and also will easily memorize because it relates to head. Cannot forget it.

    • @SteveTheVampire
      @SteveTheVampire Год назад +1

      It also helps if you use the sinonims for each word that has some. If an italian is not sure of the meaning of one word, the sinonim will clarify it with no doubt.

  • @crepooscul
    @crepooscul 2 года назад +116

    "Stai" also means "to sit" in Romanian. "Come stai" can be translated into "Cum stai" in Romanian, and it's a common expression when you want to ask someone about how are they with something specifically. like "Cum stai cu sanatatea" would translate into "How are you with your health (How's your health)." So that's how a Romanian would understand what an Italian is asking, even though the expressions for "how are you" are different.

    • @pulitoyoutube1128
      @pulitoyoutube1128 Год назад +12

      In italian it's the same, io sto means "I stay", "I stand" but olso the auxiliary before the gerundive form like "I AM doing"

    • @carron979
      @carron979 Год назад +10

      @@pulitoyoutube1128 Gerundive also exists in Romanian, but it's not used to form some kind of "present continuous" like in English or Italian.
      One may say "stau fumand", but it means "I'm smoking while staying/sitting" not quite "I'm smoking".
      "Stau fumand" or for instance "Merg fumand" ("vado fumando") just indicates 2 simultaneous actions...

    • @irrelevantdumbass5307
      @irrelevantdumbass5307 Год назад

      "stai jos" means sit down , "stai" means stay "așază-te" means sit

    • @giankion1212
      @giankion1212 Год назад +1

      ​@@carron979 sto fumando😅

    • @Indievictor
      @Indievictor Год назад +1

      Also Unde e secția de poliție can be better translated as unde e stația de poliție

  • @jayiwa
    @jayiwa 2 года назад +68

    I’m not a native speaker of both languages, but I can speak Italian to the point that I can easily pass the Italian citizenship test. I visited Romania in 2019. There were times when the locals couldn’t speak English back to me, so they simply replied in Romanian. Turns out, I could understand them and I replied back in Italian, and they understood me too. Surely, the native speakers of both languages shouldn’t have too much trouble communicating with each other.

    • @m.dewylde5287
      @m.dewylde5287 Год назад +1

      Simply speaking good Italian will not guaranty you passing the citizenship test. The test is about the political system, the history and the culture of Italy. You can speak perfectly but fail.

    • @carron979
      @carron979 Год назад +2

      @@m.dewylde5287 same for Romania. An imigrant must pass the cultural, hystorical and political test that 90% of Romanians would probably fail to pass...

    • @m.dewylde5287
      @m.dewylde5287 Год назад +1

      @@carron979 The same everywhere.

  • @Jules81channel
    @Jules81channel 2 года назад +15

    There is a connection between "fost" and the Italian verb to be "essere". In the form of past perfect of the verb "essere" called Passato Remoto in italian, the 2nd person sing. is "fosti" and the 2nd plural is "foste". Very good video by the way! Grazie! :)

  • @RyebuckCoppercap
    @RyebuckCoppercap 2 года назад +60

    Non-native Italian speaker here, I understood the Romanian samples quite well, but it also may be because I'm a native Spanish speaker and fluent in English, meaning I've got exposure to some of the Latin-derived words not found in Italian. Anyway, I found them quite similar, in the same way I find Italian and Spanish quite similar :p

  • @deacudaniel1635
    @deacudaniel1635 2 года назад +142

    As a Romanian who doesn't speak Italian, I understood around 80% of the Italian sample in this video.

    • @itacom2199
      @itacom2199 2 года назад +1

      That's cool

    • @mihuionut3721
      @mihuionut3721 2 года назад +1

      Me either

    • @wallachia4797
      @wallachia4797 2 года назад +2

      That's a bit of an exaggeration, 55-60% is more like it.

    • @mojewjewjew4420
      @mojewjewjew4420 2 года назад

      @@wallachia4797 its not a exaggeration, what are you a russian bootlicker?

    • @SilenceOase
      @SilenceOase 2 года назад +6

      @@wallachia4797 He obviously spoke for himself, so why correct the person when it comes to their own perception?:

  • @Slimbk13
    @Slimbk13 2 года назад +32

    As a child growing up in the Romanian countryside, I learned to speak Italian by watching "Stanley and Oliver" dubbed in Italian on the Rai 1 tv channel and it was so easy to understand it that all the kids on my street were able to hold a fluent conversation in Italian, as we were all following the Italian tv stations as they had many more movies and cartoons than our local ones. Even as a 7 year old kid with no history or geography classes yet, I knew that the Italians are our "cousins".

  • @alyssejazz
    @alyssejazz 2 года назад +94

    I'm a native Italian speaker and I'm currently living in Romania to do volunteering. I became almost fluent in Romanian in one month. I still have a lot to learn despite its been 4 months now. A lot of Italian people who did a similar experience in Romania told me that they used to invent words when they were struggling in talking to someone. I tried the same and it worked most of the times. Now I can see why: 77% of words have very similar roots apparently.

    • @razvanbarascu4007
      @razvanbarascu4007 Год назад +11

      Foarte interesant frate. Istoria si comunismul ne-a separat pentru un timp, dar ma incanta ca ne redescoperim cu interes.
      Dupa schisma religioasa voi ati ramas ai Romei, iar noi ai Constantinopolului. Azi Roma e Roma, Constantinopolul e Istanbul. Cu toate dificultatile astea, noi tot limba romana vorbim!
      Apropo, eu am invatat limba italiana la un nivel conversational de cand aveam 4 5 ani de pe RaiUno RaiDue RaiTre, in anii '90.
      Un abbraccio!✌️♥️

    • @SirAdrian87
      @SirAdrian87 Год назад +10

      If you are an italian in Romania and you don't know the Romanian word when speaking to someone try the Italian word. Romanian tends to have synonyms for most words and more often than not one of them is very close to Italian.

    • @HotaruDS
      @HotaruDS Год назад

  • @davidsoto7114
    @davidsoto7114 2 года назад +333

    respect to my Italian and Romanian brothers and sisters! Spanish speaking over here 🇲🇽 I can understand about %50 of what both languages were saying

    • @stalker3839
      @stalker3839 2 года назад +10

      Stay safe brother i love spanish people and i hope someday i will speak spanish very well , bt Italian and spanish are extremely closer so it wont be a big problem

    • @davidsoto7114
      @davidsoto7114 2 года назад +4

      @@stalker3839 keep pushing brother, you got this. Where are you originally from ?

    • @riotsee8553
      @riotsee8553 2 года назад +3

      Impressive

    • @dylan.dog1
      @dylan.dog1 Год назад +2

      you can understand 80% of italian

    • @niamtxiv
      @niamtxiv Год назад +5

      But Mexicans are indio while Spanish and Romanians are whites. Lol

  • @cllaudiusd521
    @cllaudiusd521 2 года назад +52

    The Romanian language is not the most difficult to understand by other speakers of Romance languages. The most difficult to understand in general are probably French and Portuguese (of course, without knowing them from school). It's just that the Romanian language is less known and publicized than the others, this is the just explanation.

  • @gixmax
    @gixmax 2 года назад +188

    Romanian speaker, can understand almost all written Italian, for the spoken form it really depends on the Italian dialect they are using. Also have some Italian friends who live here, in Romania, and they got to speak a very decent Romanian just by working and being around us for some time, without any formal education.

    • @ltubabbo529
      @ltubabbo529 2 года назад +9

      The majority of what we Italians call "dialects" are not dialects of Italian, they are real languages.
      Even among Italians it is not clear if one speaks different languages, in Italy there are more than 20 languages, so there is a good variety

    • @camelianedelcu5640
      @camelianedelcu5640 2 года назад +1

      @@ltubabbo529 Esatto la lingua rumena si parla in tutto il paese,non vi sono i dialetti come in Italia.Nel nord ovest certi parlano ungherese,questo perché sotto l'impero austro-ungarico ,con l'aiuto dei altri 3 paesi si sono permessi a prendere per un periodo la nostra TRANSILVANIA, che finalmente con il trattato di Trianon,in Francia ,nel 1918 ci fu restituita la TRANSILVANIA che è ,è ci sarà per sempre la nostra terra.Anche se ci sono altri territori che furono presi dalla Russia,Ucraina,Serbia e Bulgaria.Noi non abbiamo mai preso la terra altrui. Anche Italia ha dovuto rinunciare a certi terreni(vedi Istria).

    • @ltubabbo529
      @ltubabbo529 2 года назад +2

      @@camelianedelcu5640 Scrivi in un ottimo italiano! Brava!
      Conosco la situazione della Transilvania, a quel tempo era la zona di confine dell'impero austro-ungarico, quindi i comandati mandarono molti ungheresi lì in maniera tale da tenere sotto controllo la situazione.
      Gli istriani purtroppo sono ormai pochi, sono una minoranza. Sarebbe bello se la Corsica diventasse italiana.
      Sono felice che la Romania stia vivendo un periodo di crescita economica 😁
      Siete in tantissimi qui in Italia (1 milione), all'inizio c'è stato qualche problema tra noi, ma è normale, era una novità. A distanza di anni i rumeni si sono integrati perfettamente, molto meglio di tanti altri popoli, c'è rispetto 👍🏼

    • @ValeriusMagni
      @ValeriusMagni 2 года назад

      @@camelianedelcu5640 ci sono dialetti rumeni, il moldavo è un esempio

    • @danascully6698
      @danascully6698 2 года назад +1

      @@ValeriusMagni Non ci sono dialetti in rumeno, solo alcuni regionalismi che non influenzano in alcun modo la comprensione della lingua tra i rumeni nativi. La Moldavia è solo una regione storica della Romania.

  • @AlinaMuntean98
    @AlinaMuntean98 2 года назад +44

    I used to have an Italian neighbor (I'm Romanian) and he was talking in Italian, I was talking in Romanian and somehow we figured it out what we want to say and understand each other in our own language. And when we came across an unknown word, we tried both with our language and body language 🤌🤌to explain what that word is about. The whole experience was funny for us.

  • @Vercixx
    @Vercixx 2 года назад +26

    Romanian here. In high-school we had a choice to learn between Italian and French and many chose Italian. Too many! So the Italian teacher, a very nice guy, came to us and said: listen kids, Italian is a language you can learn when you're old, there's no need to rush into it right now, pick more difficult languages now when you're young :)

  • @MrInovasoft
    @MrInovasoft 2 года назад +155

    I am Romanian, I've learned Italian by watching Italian TV channels in the 90's, such as Italia 1 , Rete 4, Canale 5. I've visited Italy first time in 2003 and when I've arrived there I could understand everything and talk to people as if I lived there for years! Italian is the easiest language to learn for Romanians. The languages are so similar that Romanians who live in Italy for a while start mixing up the two languages and become the subject of jokes when they return to Romania because they have forgotten their own language..

    • @trinitron40237
      @trinitron40237 2 года назад +16

      Same story, '97-'98 every morning on Canale 5 for A-Team, Back to the future, Starsky and Hutch, afternoons with "Non e la RAI" with Ambra. 😊

    • @CapitanDePlai
      @CapitanDePlai 2 года назад +11

      The mixing of italian and romanian words is terrible and also cringe when you listen to someone that does it continuosly

    • @m.dewylde5287
      @m.dewylde5287 Год назад +8

      @@CapitanDePlai I like it a lot. Most Romanian young people are semi-literate, anyway. They sound better when they drop Italian words into their speech, rather than using broken Romanian.

    • @OneTireFire
      @OneTireFire Год назад

      Same story

    • @andreidcs2113
      @andreidcs2113 Год назад +11

      Cum a patit Florin Raducioiu :))

  • @cv5w
    @cv5w 2 года назад +135

    Interestingly, regarding the greeting "salut" (which comes from French or more likely learned Latin), it is a doublet of the word "sărut" which comes directly from the same exact Latin word, following the classic sound changes from Latin to Romanian (rhotacism, where the L between vowels became an R). "Sărut" means kiss (noun).

    • @vlina4123
      @vlina4123 2 года назад +8

      Nu! Sărut e de la za+rot (slav) = înseamnă *de gură*, doar înaite spuneau: a da guriță, a da buzele. Zâmbi de la *zubi* (slav. dinți).

    • @cutecatlolxd3972
      @cutecatlolxd3972 2 года назад +1

      @@vlina4123 bro parcă ești copilu care întreabă pentru tema de acasă

    • @davidl2684
      @davidl2684 2 года назад +9

      @@vlina4123 Interesantă teorie, ai vreo sursă? Că nu am găsit nimic. Pare totuși puțin probabil, pentru că, de obicei, cuvintele românești provenite de la cuvinte slavone cu prefixul „za” păstrează sunetul „z” (zăpadă, zadar, etc.).

    • @ionelflorea2116
      @ionelflorea2116 2 года назад +3

      @@davidl2684 nici nu e adevarat..nimeni nu adopta cuvinte in felul asta, prin alipirea e doua ca sa faca unu

    • @sorincalciu
      @sorincalciu 2 года назад +18

      @@davidl2684 "A săruta", din latină "salutare"! Conform "Dicţionarului Limbii Romîne Moderne", Buc. 1958 (când România s-a scris la un moment dat la ordin cu "î," sub influenţă sovietică, ca să părem pentru unii mai mult slavi decât latini). Exact aceeaşi etimologie a cuvântului "a săruta" din latină "salutare" o stabileşte şi "Dicţionarul Enciclopedic Cartea Românească" I.A. Candrea, Buc. 1931. Nu, nu văd nicio legătură cu vreo limbă slavă aici. În rusă, de ex. se spune "целовать" (tselovat') "a săruta".

  • @fabianp1011
    @fabianp1011 2 года назад +91

    As a native Spanish speaker, these are two of my favorite languages 😍😍 So beautiful

    • @HotaruDS
      @HotaruDS Год назад +2

      ❤ Spanish and italian are also in my top 5 fav languages. Romanian here. 🤗

  • @vilmosmanyoki-gv5gq
    @vilmosmanyoki-gv5gq Год назад +99

    I do love Romanian people, they're plyathe, smart, adaptive & funny, and IMHO your language is the most beautiful Latin language, the No.2 is Brazil dialect ❤

  • @paholainen100
    @paholainen100 2 года назад +94

    If you speak southern Calabrian or Sicilian , you can see the similarities to Romanian. In Calabrian we say “ scusa” unde Este ??” In Romanian it’s the same ( almost ) “ ma scuzat unde este” and there are many words we have in common.

    • @esti-od1mz
      @esti-od1mz 2 года назад +20

      Exactly, in trapanese sicilian it would sound like "scusa (d)unni, jesti?""

    • @annaandrea8320
      @annaandrea8320 2 года назад +21

      I watched "L' Amica Geniale" and I was so shocked when I heard mia sorella (my sister), tua sorella (your sister) pronounced like: sòrma = soră-mea (Romanian), sòrta = soră-ta (Romanian).

    • @annaandrea8320
      @annaandrea8320 2 года назад +6

      @@esti-od1mz, in Transylvanian dialect the equivalent would be pronounced: Scuze, diune ieșci?

    • @Bunny-kp1zd
      @Bunny-kp1zd 2 года назад +12

      In sardo "aundi esti?"

    • @paholainen100
      @paholainen100 2 года назад +11

      @@Bunny-kp1zd yes sardo too. A limba sarda, a limba romana

  • @Salvador0991
    @Salvador0991 2 года назад +6

    Tremendos sus vídeos profe, I'm training my english ears, and learn all of these linguistic stuff. I'm very thankful🤗👍🏻 Greetings from Venezuela.

  • @yavitvexe9997
    @yavitvexe9997 2 года назад +20

    that is interesing, just recently I saw some Romanian subtitles in some video, so first when I saw them I thought they were Italian😀 It's surprising how much they have in common, as well as with other Romance languages. and having some knowledge in them I understood almost everything

  • @pieroschneider2783
    @pieroschneider2783 2 года назад +31

    Hi, very interesting. I am Piero, an Italian native speaker keen of languages (I can speak five and now studyning my sixth.....). I actually think that the written forms of the two languages are easily understandable one another. Different thing for the spoken language, as in my opinion Romanian phonetic has strongly been influenced by the surrounding eastern European languages. But if an Italian and a Romenian guy want to comunicate between them , if they both speak slowly and carefully chose among the synonyms if some word seems to be not understood by the other side, I think they can for sure find a way out and communicate in a quite complete way and without big obstacles.
    One more thing: about the form "fost" for "to be" (past) in Romanian (more or less minute 11.00 in the video). In Itailan we have a "past tense" called "passato remoto" further back in time than the more common "passato prossimo", and in some dialects, specially in southern Italy is often used in place of the "passato prossimo. The passato remoto for the 2nd singular person of the verb "essere" (to be) is "(tu) fosti" and could some how be related with the Romanian "fost".
    Thank you for your videos, all of them very very interesting and useful! Have a nice evening! Piero

    • @lucreziaracca4590
      @lucreziaracca4590 Год назад +1

      @@3wL7 I think "passato remoto" is equivalent to "passé simple" in French

    • @ioanadreesen4222
      @ioanadreesen4222 Год назад

      ​@@3wL7 perfectul simplu

    • @adrian.farcas
      @adrian.farcas Год назад +2

      The problem for you is not necessarily phonetics, but Romanian grammar - especially the articles glued the end of the words and the genitive/dative case. In Italian the article stands in front, separated, and cases are formed with prepositions. These are easy to understand from the Romanian perspective (which also uses prepositions for accusative) but not the other way round...

    • @adrianabutmalai2590
      @adrianabutmalai2590 Год назад +1

      In Romanian "passato remoto" (perfectul simplu) is solved by meaning, for example the verb "I was" "am fost" means that I was there a day, a month, a year ago.
      If you say "I was" using the verbs "fui" or "fusăi" it means I was there recently, a minute or a second ago.
      It should be mentioned that in the southern part of Romania the language closest to Old Latin is spoken.

  • @fedcard
    @fedcard 2 года назад +20

    As a Spanish speaker, I once listened to Nicolae Ceaușescu's final speech and was able to understand half of what he said without the need for subtitles. The other half, because of the context, I could more or less understand. "Capitali socialisti, participati populari, Bucuresti, un salut.... aló, aló" It seemed like the Pope when he was already old. XD

  • @jaxzor
    @jaxzor 2 года назад +33

    I`m a Romanian, and few years ago me and my brother (both romanian speekers) went to a MotoGP race in Spielberg (Austira), we were surounded by Italian people (huge motorsport fan base), and at some point a group of Italian dudes and girls offered us beers and asked us from what region of Italy are we cause they understand what we`re talking but not everything...they tought we`re joking when we said we`re from Romania...

    • @civfanatic8853
      @civfanatic8853 2 года назад +8

      That shows how unknown rou really is as the 5th major romance language and of course how underrated Rou is as a country and thats happening in Europe, not in Africa or east Asia. That shows again how bad rou are at promoting their culture in general, but also how ignorant the western europe is when it comes to the eastern half of the continent. Almost a paradox 😯😕😪

    • @giorgiodifrancesco4590
      @giorgiodifrancesco4590 Год назад +1

      Non esageriamo. It depends on who you've been dealing with.

    • @carron979
      @carron979 Год назад +6

      That's a happy situation, but once I was in Nice at a hotel in the elevator when an Italian couple got in, smiling and cheerfully speaking Italian. Than my father spoke to my mother in Romanian and at the ground level the Italian lady left the elevator saying "arrivederci..." turning her back to my father without looking at him. Her smile dissapeared and the tone of her voice changed so much, my father understood she was upset if not vexed so he got confused like "what did I do?". I had to explain to him that the Italian lady must have taken him for an arogant countryman (maybe speaking in his dialect) unwilling to salute or engage in a little small talk with some other Italian fellows... 🙂

    • @danascully6698
      @danascully6698 Год назад +8

      @@civfanatic8853 You forget that Romania was an isolated country for almost 45 years, thanks to the Russian "friends". Europe and the entire free world didn't even know Romania existed and only now, for about 20-25 years, they discover this country with its language and culture!

    • @giorgiodifrancesco4590
      @giorgiodifrancesco4590 Год назад

      @@carron979 There is no possibility that an Italian would mistake a person who speaks Romanian for a person who speaks an Italian dialect. Romanian and Italian dialects are too different from each other. The lady said hello because we are taught to be polite even in the lifts.
      I speak several Romance languages (Italian, French, Spanish), one Italian dialect and I understand others quite well, but if I hear spoken Romanian I understand it only partially, because there are too many Slavic and Hungarian words mixed in with the Latin ones. Furthermore, Latin words often have a totally different meaning from what they originally had. Not to mention, in Romanian, the real inventions of neo-Latin verbs coined starting from Latin words, but forgetting the original Latin verb.
      On the other hand, I understand quite a bit of Romanian if I hear the news, because I understand what it's about. I understand it much more if I read it.

  • @alexandertumarkin5343
    @alexandertumarkin5343 2 года назад +199

    I'm a Ukrainian, and appeared the first time in Romania in 2000, just accidentally, I hadn't planned to. To my surprise, I understood Romanian fairly well, as for an unprepared young guy. Felt like lots of words were quite international (after all, we all have some words borrowed from Latin, maybe in scientific sphere, but not only), and was able to communicate somehow. When I was in Romania the second time, as well as in Moldova, I could communicate even better, but probably that's just because I had improved some other Romance languages, like Spanish and Italian. So I'd say that the knowledge of Italian does help in Romania as well.
    Times have changed, we are not allowed to leave the country, previously because of covid and now because of the war, men are supposed to either defend our country, or work for supporting our economy, but I'm still missing my youth adventures with going to other countries and their provinces, where people speak nothing but their own languages.

    • @re_di_roma_is_back2388
      @re_di_roma_is_back2388 2 года назад +4

      Weird. I found Ukrainian very similar to Russian

    • @alexandertumarkin5343
      @alexandertumarkin5343 2 года назад +22

      @@re_di_roma_is_back2388 Yes, quite similar, it's a Slavic language whereas Romanian isn't. Still, we have some words just derive from Latin or other languages. Particularly, one of the first phrase that I understood when I arrived at the train station 22 years ago, was "Nu circulă tramvaiele". In Ukrainian it would sound differently, but here's why I understood it: "Nu" cognates with "No/Not" in English, or "Ne" in Ukrainian, so it's clearly a negation. "Tramvaiele" - well, the word is international, it's "tramvai" in Ukrainian. And "circula" - we have the word "tsickuliatsiya", it's never used for public transport, it exists mostly in science, like physics or biology, but it's easy to understand.
      Another reason is that some words in Romanian are loaned from Slavic, even the word "da" ("yes").

    • @Dany94256
      @Dany94256 2 года назад +15

      Слава Україні!
      ти в безпеці?
      Good to see a message from one of your guys! Are you safe for now, over there?

    • @valentinovidiucornea4525
      @valentinovidiucornea4525 2 года назад +8

      @@alexandertumarkin5343 Another word in Romanian are loaned from Slavic, is "pizda". Pornografic but true!!!

    • @carron979
      @carron979 2 года назад +2

      @@valentinovidiucornea4525 very true, it's an unconditional stimulus... Pavlov-wise, I mean :-))))

  • @sapinta
    @sapinta Год назад +15

    It's fun that Dumneavoastra is the equivalent of "lei", because it sounds so like "la signorìa vostra" (with dumnea sounding like dominus), which is an old reverential form to address someone socially above you.

    • @Sabinathor
      @Sabinathor 5 месяцев назад +2

      You get it right! That's exactly what it ment. Like or something... it's extremely polite.

    • @andreeas.2362
      @andreeas.2362 4 месяца назад

      Domn meant also ruler/highness. Ex Domn al Moldovei (Dominus Moldavie). Doamna- domina. Or Dumnezeu. Dominus + zeu /dzeu- deus. His Highness God -God All Mighty.

  • @TenorCantusFirmus
    @TenorCantusFirmus 2 года назад +41

    As a native Italian speaker, understanding spoken Romanian isn't actually that much more difficult than understanding some Italian Dialects. I might even take it for Neapolitan, while i.e. Calabrese is much harder than both to understand.
    Written Romanian might be easier, expecially if you have studied Latin.

  • @Langfocus
    @Langfocus  2 года назад +224

    Hi, everyone! I hope you like the video! If you're learning Romanian, check out RomanianPod101 ► bit.ly/Romanianpod101 ◄ And if you're learning Italian, check out ItalianPod101 ► bit.ly/pod101italian ◄
    And for 32 other languages, see langfocus.com/pod101
    (Disclosure: Langfocus is an affiliate partner and receives a small referral fee from paid signups, something which helps support this channel)

    • @dnation3316
      @dnation3316 2 года назад +2

      Can you do Greek and Latin

    • @fg68g2nyd
      @fg68g2nyd 2 года назад +2

      Just letting you know that the link for the italianPod101 is not working in either this comment or description. I'm assuming is because of the arrow at the end of the link.

    • @Fortapistone
      @Fortapistone 2 года назад

      In my opinion I see more similarity with Portuguese and Romanian. Especially in the verbs perspective, here in your examples.

    • @myriadar
      @myriadar 2 года назад +2

      Onde in Portuguese is the only Latin Lingo as far as I know, that 'Unde' in Romanian is basically the same.

    • @darkseid9391
      @darkseid9391 2 года назад +1

      How many languages does the narrator speak

  • @AgathaLOutahere
    @AgathaLOutahere 2 года назад +57

    Also some interesting vocabulary parallels between Romanian and Persian that follow similar patterns, such as Romanian "Apa" (unvoiced consonant) and Persian "ab" (voiced consonant) for "water" and Romanian "suta" and Persian "sad" for "one hundred", same consonant change. I am sure there are other examples.

    • @selcovoilucian8253
      @selcovoilucian8253 2 года назад +7

      Apa comes from Dacian opa

    • @valevisa8429
      @valevisa8429 2 года назад +16

      @@selcovoilucian8253 Si de unde stii tu ca dacii ziceau Opa la Apa ???

    • @acinletux
      @acinletux 2 года назад +8

      Aqua

    • @FullMetalPier
      @FullMetalPier 2 года назад +6

      Water in Latin is "Aqua"

    • @nichiforalbu9035
      @nichiforalbu9035 2 года назад +2

      @@valevisa8429 Putem presupune de la Cuvântul Axiapa*(la greci Axiopolis), care e denumirea primară a orașului Apă Neagră care în limba bulgară se numește Cerna-voda )))))

  • @andreeas.2362
    @andreeas.2362 Год назад +127

    IF you compare ROmanian with southern Italian dialects, the closeness is striking. It is important to know that most of the legions stationed in Dacia were from southern Italy.

    • @Meridianux
      @Meridianux Год назад +11

      E posibil! Erau veniti si din regiunea Genoa in Dacia, nu numai din sudul Italiei!

    • @dancroitoru364
      @dancroitoru364 Год назад +17

      As usual they sent the southerners, I suppose the Milanese were too busy doing business -)

    • @cridr
      @cridr Год назад +1

      do not say that to our west friends ... it is blasphemy there to say that ..

    • @leilagreen7
      @leilagreen7 Год назад +1

      @@dancroitoru364😂😂 😂

    • @ver_idem
      @ver_idem Год назад +1

      No way the southern part of Italy inherited more of the latina vulgata,the northern part have bigger tuskany,gaulish and germanic heritage,about the legions at the apogeum of the empire it was only classical latin used but only few people were "real romans" just comandants,officers and the leading corps,rest of the troops were scattered from every part of the Empire.

  • @PaulNechifor
    @PaulNechifor 2 года назад +36

    Some notes:
    * Besides the short infinitive ("a auzi" = to listen), Romanian also has long infinitives ("auzire") with the "-re" ending from the original Latin. Short infinitives are more common which is why they're the form used in the dictionary.
    * You've missed "ț" (t with a comma) which is the only letter unique to Romanian (it represents the "ts" sound, like z in "pizza").
    * You translated "to have" as "avea". You're missing "a". It's "a avea" or "avere". "Avea" just means "had".

    • @ACIDVENOM2501
      @ACIDVENOM2501 2 года назад +8

      I agree with you but I'd like to complete your 1st and 3rd notes:
      - long infinitives correspond indeed to feminine nouns in romanian so that this -re ending can be seen as a suffix (whose meaning is similar to the -ție / -sie / -țiune / -siune suffixes restricted to verbs with latin roots I guess), for example:
      * a pregăti = to prepare -> pregătirea = the preparation
      * a gândi = to think -> gândirea = the thought
      * a aduna = to gather -> adunarea = the gathering
      * a întâlni = to meet -> întâlnirea = the meeting
      * a stăpâni = to control/to master -> stăpânirea = the mastery
      - romanian builds its imperfect tense the same way as french and italian (and I guess as well as other western romance languages too) build actually their simple future tense (verb stem with endings corresponding indeed to the auxiliary verb a avea as used in the compound perfect tense)
      * a cânta (to sing) ->
      cânt+∅+am (I sang),
      cânt+∅+ai (you (singular) sang),
      cânt+∅+a (he/she sang),
      cânt+∅+am (we sang),
      cânt+∅+ați (you (plural) sang),
      cânt+∅+au (they sang)
      * a primi (to send) -> prim+e+a (he/she sent)
      * a face (to do/to make) -> fac+e+a (he/she did/made)
      * a avea (to have) -> av+e+a (he/she had)
      that's why forgetting the a before the (short) infinitive can lead to confusion with this other form

  • @ClaudioBrogliato
    @ClaudioBrogliato 2 года назад +97

    I happened to see a video in youtube. At first I thought it was a slavic language for the accent but then I realized I was understanding too many words, it was Romanian.

  • @enigmaster84
    @enigmaster84 2 года назад +32

    As an Italian, I was surprised by how much I could understand in the first short example! Romanian always catches my curiosity but I've never got into it. You've just given me another reason to start :)

  • @mirceadraga7421
    @mirceadraga7421 Год назад +1

    Foarte profesionistă această analiză a dumneavoastră! Sunt impresionat de precizia și acuratețea ei. Felicitări! :)

  • @Pokerface-tr1ds
    @Pokerface-tr1ds 2 года назад +32

    I am romanian born, but I live in Germany. I have some italian co workerst and we gave each other some examples and all of us were quite amazed how similar our languages are. Here is an example: Italians say "Morto di foame" while Romanians say "mort de foame". So... work it out :)

  • @boldisordorin9010
    @boldisordorin9010 2 года назад +35

    12:39 in romanian we can also use "e" instead of "este" or "unde-i" instead of "unde este". Station in romanian is also translated as "stație"

    • @FullMetalPier
      @FullMetalPier 2 года назад +10

      Let's bring our languages closer! ;) Greetings from Verona!

    • @askallois
      @askallois Год назад +2

      In sardo "Andi esti" significa "dove sei", praticamente uguale

    • @user-tr9fy3nl9yro
      @user-tr9fy3nl9yro Год назад

      Stațiune în Romanian means resort.

  • @nicolaramoso3286
    @nicolaramoso3286 2 года назад +265

    I'm an Italian speaker who's learning Romanian and sometimes it feels like English: not because they are similar but because there are a lot of day-to-day words that are very different from the Italian ones, whether because they come from Slavic or Turkish but as soon as you start to delve into the more modern or academic vocabulary then a large amount of words become very similar.
    Like the difference between "shy" and "timid": the latter comes from Latin but it's less used colloquially compared to the former.
    That of course is not representative of how the language really is it's just how it feels to me sometimes.

    • @mojewjewjew4420
      @mojewjewjew4420 2 года назад +18

      Idk what your experience is with romanian but turkish has a miniscule influence and slavic is also small, most likely you meet words from latin that arent used alot in latin or many words in recent times are borrowed from english, slavic words are few but used quite often like război,drujbă,etc.

    • @nicolaramoso3286
      @nicolaramoso3286 2 года назад +22

      @@mojewjewjew4420 well I wouldn't say that there are only a few slavic words used frequently in Romanian
      Like "noroc, dragoste, slujbă" there are several examples
      But yeah in general you're right maybe many of these words have a different Latin origin
      Several come from Greek for example

    • @meneldur666
      @meneldur666 2 года назад +10

      @@mojewjewjew4420 there are quite a lot of Slavic influences, but I think nowadays they're not as common in colloquial Romanian. Words like văzduh, for example, for which most people would use cer instead. In my limited experience, of course.

    • @Cris-hd1wb
      @Cris-hd1wb 2 года назад +11

      The number of Latin words is constantly increasing, and the non-Latin vocabulary tends to turn archaic. You’ll notice this in literature especially, where you’ll find many Slavic words that have nowadays been replaced with Latin counterparts in daily speech. I think it’s rly cool because it greatly expands the vocabulary.

    • @Cris-hd1wb
      @Cris-hd1wb 2 года назад +7

      @@mojewjewjew4420 there are many many Slavic, Turkish and Greek words, but they’re slowly being replaced

  • @cristiangirbea
    @cristiangirbea Год назад +20

    I’m native romanian and never learned french or italian. But while visiting France, we went to see the Barber of Seville at the Opera. The play is sung in Italian and subtitles were in French. To my surprise, I understood 80% of the words and got the whole story and details just by using the similarities with Romanian

  • @blotski
    @blotski 2 года назад +123

    I'm a native speaker of English. I studied Russian and French at university and later learned Spanish up to about C1 level. I spoke no Italian. I have been learning Romanian for about 5 years and have reached about C1 level too. I found both Spanish and Russian helpful in my Romanian studies. Although Romanian is mostly Latin in its structure there are a lot of Slavic borrowings. However, since I learnt Romanian it has really surprised me how much Italian I can guess the meaning of! I've never studied Italian but Romanian has really opened up Italian to me. However, I think it's probably easier for a Romanian speaker to guess the meaning of Italian words than vice versa.

    • @cosdache
      @cosdache 2 года назад +3

      Romanian and Russian are the online europea languages with the sound î/â.

    • @mihaidanielescu
      @mihaidanielescu 2 года назад +8

      Congrats ! Getting to C level in a romance language is really tough for english and germans. I'm romanian living in Spain and I can see it is not easy for them.

    • @DarkAncientZ
      @DarkAncientZ 2 года назад

      @@cosdache And Polish.

    • @willmurphy4073
      @willmurphy4073 2 года назад +2

      Same with me and Norwegian (as a native English speaker), I can understand the majority of Danish and Swedish written. With the help of Norwegian (and some old English and Icelandic, plus studying Germanic sound shifts), I can also sort of understand languages like Frisian and Dutch. German loanwords into Norwegian also help me with German too

    • @nel_dubbio_mena
      @nel_dubbio_mena 2 года назад

      @@cosdache
      What russian sound is î? There isnt

  • @doubletrouble9503
    @doubletrouble9503 2 года назад +3

    This video is downright bloody awesome. I've been interested in this topic for so long and here we have it condensed in a short easy-to-view clip. KEEP IT UP PAUL !!!!!

  • @3dfxvoodoocards6
    @3dfxvoodoocards6 2 года назад +59

    I worked with some italian colleagues here in Romania a few years ago, I was shocked to see that after 1-2 years in Romania they spoke very advanced romanian in some cases close to native romanian, with a slight italian accent.

    • @FreedomAlternative
      @FreedomAlternative 2 года назад

      Here's a British woman and an Italian man speaking Romanian - ruclips.net/video/5uDWv0lgnMM/видео.html

    • @kittykatariel9716
      @kittykatariel9716 2 года назад +15

      I also worked with some Italians here in Romania ( they were from different regions in Italy) and they all spoke very well Romanian with a beautiful Italian accent.

  • @SebastianMorath
    @SebastianMorath 2 года назад +31

    Well as a Chinese who live in Spain almost 10 years. that 30 sec Romanian Sample I can understand about 60%, and the Italian part I can basiclly understand all.

    • @bzcup
      @bzcup 2 года назад +2

      The text choice for romanian was unfortunate. He should have used the same text for both languages or a similar text for a usual activity like the italian sample.

  • @AntonioDamicis
    @AntonioDamicis 2 года назад +159

    I'm Italian and I have been living in Romania for about 15 years.
    When I first arrived in Romania, I could understand 20% of a conversation, but 50-60% of written language.
    After about 3 months, I could understand 80% of both spoken and written language.
    By studying the language or having continuous exposure, I believe an Italian with a good educational level can speak Romanian decently in around one year.
    The most intelligible Romanian for an Italian is the modern academic one. A little less the popular speech, to understand which it is necessarily necessary to learn the slang of the place.
    The initially most difficult thing for an Italian is the learning and correct pronunciation of a whole series of words of Slavic, Hungarian or Turkish origin.
    In modern Romanian these words are used less than in the written / spoken Romanian of the early twentieth century. The literature of that period is in fact difficult to understand for an Italian who has not studied the language in depth.
    On the contrary, many Romanians in their first visit to Italy, are able to understand a good part of a conversation. Much depends on the fact that many Romanians are somehow more exposed to Italian than Italians to Romanian and also that the influences of foreign languages on Italian (Arabic/Germanic) are lower than on Romanian (especially Slavic). This is especially true when the Romanian speaker:
    - has a good schooling
    - knows other languages of Latin origin
    - meets people who speak the standard Italian :)

    • @PopescuSorin
      @PopescuSorin Год назад +2

      also many Romanians are exposed to Spanish (telenovelas)

    • @carron979
      @carron979 Год назад +3

      I wonder how you dealed with recognising the latin words that Romanian inherited in a "too intact" form from Latin, like sarcina, lumina, frigul, inhumare, incepere...
      Or tricky words like "falca/falci" from latin "falx" but with a completely different meaning than "falce" in Italian

    • @pulitoyoutube1128
      @pulitoyoutube1128 Год назад

      I think that if you can understand and memorize all the words in the romanian Bible without problem your work is done, you know romanian

    • @AntonioDamicis
      @AntonioDamicis Год назад +14

      @@carron979 You know? I am from Salento, in Puglia, South Italy.
      It happens that, some Romanian words coming from Latin and which are not similar to Italian, are similar to Salentino dialect or maybe to other Italian dialect of which I have some knowledge.
      As example, "sarcina" in my dialect means "luggage" (somehow changed the sense of the word), "lumina" is "lumi", "frig" is "friddu", etc.
      Same for other words/expressions like eu (I), socra (mother in law), suecru (father in law), fiiu (son), ce faci? (how are you doing?), picca (a little) , etc.
      What I mean is that somehow I can guess if a word comes from Latin or not.
      The most tricky words for me are those ones like "a zbura", which according to Dexonline comes from "Exvolare", so it seems to have the same origin of the Italian "volare", but becuase of that "ZB" I could not figure out (onestly, I thought it was a Slavic word).

    • @Meridianux
      @Meridianux Год назад +4

      Buna seara! De acord cu tine! Imi place limba italiana! Pentru noi e mai simplu sa deducem ce zice un italian! Ai nevoie de un an de zile de studiu pentru a intelege foarte bine limba romana! Noi suntem frati, doua popoare, cu o singura inima ce bate in piept!

  • @dayanbalevski4446
    @dayanbalevski4446 2 года назад +384

    I always knew Romanian was similar to Italian, but I could never quantify it - this helps!
    All in all, I feel that Italian seems to be simpler than Romanian just by this video comparison, but maybe I am wrong.
    Cheers from Bulgaria neighbours.

    • @mojewjewjew4420
      @mojewjewjew4420 2 года назад +15

      Thats weird, i though youd find our language easier bc we are neighbors and have some slavic words.

    • @dayanbalevski4446
      @dayanbalevski4446 2 года назад +21

      @@mojewjewjew4420 That is true, but this video makes Italian look simpler to me. I visit Romania relatively often, and I have friends there, so I have more exposure
      But the direct comparison to Italian makes it look more complicated/harder for someone to learn.

    • @IceWolf75
      @IceWolf75 2 года назад +28

      @@mojewjewjew4420 We have "some" Slavic words but I'd say it's too little for a native Slavic speaker to understand Romanian.

    • @HeroManNick132
      @HeroManNick132 2 года назад +11

      @@IceWolf75 Bogdan is a Slavic name haha.

    • @darui9185
      @darui9185 2 года назад +1

      Don't translate.. ତୁମେ ଅଭିଶାପିତ କାରଣ ଯଦି ତୁମେ ଅଭିଶାପ ଭାଙ୍ଗିବ ନାହିଁ ତୁମେ ମରିବ, ଅଭିଶାପକୁ ଭାଙ୍ଗିବାର ଏକମାତ୍ର ଉପାୟ ହେଉଛି ମୋ ଚ୍ୟାନେଲକୁ ସବସ୍କ୍ରାଇବ କରିବା

  • @isometrix415
    @isometrix415 2 года назад +24

    I'm Romanian and i live in Italy
    I've noticed that many words that contains d in Italian are the same word in Romanian with Z
    Italian - Dici; Romanian - Zici
    Italian - Dieci; Romanian - Zece (not the same but quite similar)
    Italian - Decimale; Romanian - Zecimală
    Italian - Dimmi; Romanian - Zimi
    And many more, almost every word that starts with D in Italian, will start with Z in Romanian

    • @user-tr9fy3nl9yro
      @user-tr9fy3nl9yro Год назад +4

      În 200 hundred years ago written Romanian, prezent Z letter was written D with underwriting of " , " like in și (and).

    • @empyrionin
      @empyrionin Год назад +4

      Not just written, but pronounced "dz" as in "dzece", "dzi-mi", "dumnedzeu". Even today it is regionally pronounced like that. Also in Aromanian today: "dzătsi/dumnidzali"

    • @mcsmiha1973
      @mcsmiha1973 Год назад

      throughout time there have been some phonetic changes one of them was d-z. you might also notice q-p, ct-pt, etc

  • @Gabriel.Silviu
    @Gabriel.Silviu 2 года назад +27

    As a romanian been living and working in Italy for 2 years, I learned the language in just 3 months. The languages are so close to each other

    • @nel_dubbio_mena
      @nel_dubbio_mena 2 года назад

      In 3 months You didn't learn the language, you learnt the way to make you understand, but probably you speak italian like a 2 yo baby.

  • @gi1937
    @gi1937 2 года назад +19

    Italian here. I noticed that from the point of view of fonetics, Romanian tends to have some "double" vowels (diphthongs) more than Italian, like in "moarte" (italian "morte" death) and I got to now that sometimes that doble vowel happens is Friulan language too, where it's pronounced "muart" (Friulan is a romance north-eastern regional language of Italy). A comparison within the to could be interesting. Moreover, typically Friulan and Venetan have Slavic loanwords too to some extent

    • @carron979
      @carron979 Год назад +4

      there is a "language continuum" starting in Sicily going up north, throu the south of France to Spain and Portugal. "Continuum" means that people of one village can undestand speakers of the next next village, but not always if you skip villages. This continuum is broken to the east on the ex -Yougoslav space. Meaning Friulian speakers cannot really understand Istro-romanians, Megleno-romanians or Aromanians. And I myself as a Romanian have a hard time understanding Aromanian language...

    • @giorgiodifrancesco4590
      @giorgiodifrancesco4590 Год назад

      @@carron979 There are videos on RUclips where you can hear Arumanian being spoken, and for an Italian they are certainly more understandable than those in a South Slavic dialect, with which we share only essential words, being an Indo-European language, but of the "satem" subgroup (while ours is of the "kentum" subgroup).

    • @carron979
      @carron979 Год назад +5

      @@giorgiodifrancesco4590 well, interestingly enough the Romanian word for "hundred" is "suta" clearly derived from "satem" while all (and I really mean ALL) the other numerals are of latin origin and Latin belongs to the "kentum" subgroup.
      So either "suta" is a slavic loanword (sto) or a relic of the extinct and unknown Dacian language belonging maybe to the "satem".
      In any case I don't see much practical utility in this classification/division... satem/kentum

    • @giorgiodifrancesco4590
      @giorgiodifrancesco4590 Год назад +1

      @@carron979 I think it's a relic, because the dacian was a "satem" language.
      However, Thracologist Sorin Olteanu hypothesizes that Daco-Thracian was originally a kentum language, part of a Greco-Macedonian branch; but that then Daco-Thracian was influenced by Balto-Slavic, causing over time a change of the language from kentum to satem.

    • @user-tr9fy3nl9yro
      @user-tr9fy3nl9yro Год назад

      Spanish muerte.

  • @aliancemd
    @aliancemd Год назад +12

    10:45 For “stato” there is the Romanian word “stat”(Ai stat in Franta?) which also means “to stay”, you usually go through Romanian synonyms and you can find a matching word that makes you understand the meaning of a Italian phrase.
    Personal story: I speak Romanian natively and we had relatives from Italy visit us for 1 month. Their kids knew only Italian, so they would speak to us in Italian, most of the times we would understand them, when not, they or we would go through Italian/Romanian synonyms of the word and there was always some matching word. In a few days it was quite easy to understand them, after you understood that words like “Parole” don’t mean “Password”(Romanian “Parola”), you covered their most used words

  • @alexandru59139
    @alexandru59139 2 года назад +35

    Fun fact, the word "Grazie" exists also in Romanian as "grație" (it's pronounced the same), but with a different meaning; it means "grace".

    • @DinuNoroc
      @DinuNoroc 2 года назад +22

      Or "Grație acestui lucru, s-a întâmplat asta", which means " thanks to / because of this [ thing] , this [ other thing ] happened "

    • @alexandru59139
      @alexandru59139 2 года назад +3

      @@DinuNoroc yea, I missed this case. Thanks!

    • @zarzavattzarzavatt9309
      @zarzavattzarzavatt9309 Год назад +6

      because it's a borrowing from Italian, or maybe french, or latin :)

    • @Gabriel_Dinisov
      @Gabriel_Dinisov Год назад +4

      “Grazie” in Romanian with the Italian meaning is “gratitudine”!

    • @floraflowers
      @floraflowers Год назад

      @@zarzavattzarzavatt9309 For "thank you" we have "multumesc" but the shortened version was taken from the French "merci" and it's become so widespread that it's used in day to day conversations by just about anyone to the point where "multumesc" is oftentimes used only in formal contexts.

  • @jennyhammond9261
    @jennyhammond9261 2 года назад +36

    I'm fluent in Spanish and previously couldn't understand any Romanian, but could understand a decent amount of Italian. Now that I'm actually learning Italian, I can catch bits and pieces of Romanian.

    • @razvanbarascu4007
      @razvanbarascu4007 2 года назад +2

      'A mea muiere e cea mai frumoasa si sta cu mine de palavre toata ziua.' 😂😂

    • @bradsorin1969
      @bradsorin1969 Год назад

      becouse you all latins have our roots,we can speak easy italian or spanish our languadge is rich,is the older traco getaes pelasgian...we are not romans slaves,Dacia was not conquer

    • @danascully6698
      @danascully6698 Год назад

      @@bradsorin1969 Maximum a quarter of Dacia (Transylvania, Banat and a part of Oltenia) was Roman province.

  • @madalinaplop9932
    @madalinaplop9932 Год назад +7

    I am a native romanian speaker that moved to Italy at 11 years old. I immediately understood the language and it took me 7 months to speak it fluently, of course going to an italian school helped a lot.
    I now have a bachelor's and master's degree in foreign languages and I studied french and spanish along with the literature and the history of romance languages. It is so fascinating to me and for that I wanted to thank you for this video.
    I have a question though...do you thing that portuguese is the most similar language to romanian? I've heard lots of people, even my professors, say that but I didn't have the opportunity to learn or appeoach to portuguese.
    Thank you, you are awesome! 😊😊😊

    • @mcsmiha1973
      @mcsmiha1973 Год назад +1

      i am romanian and i also studied foreign languages[germanic languages though] but we continuously had linguistics and compared linguistics courses and i do remember my professors saying the exact same thing. the truth is that when i listen to portuguese i understand a loooot less than i do in italian or spanish, even french. so, my conclusion is that the two languages might be close on grammar realm rather than phonology. perhaps if we study a bit of the phonological changes throughout time we might understand more. i never tried...

    • @madalinaplop9932
      @madalinaplop9932 Год назад

      That's interesting, you might be right! 😊

  • @afz902k
    @afz902k 2 года назад +92

    I speak Spanish and normally don't understand any Romanian, but having the Italian side by side really helps!

    • @Pangui008
      @Pangui008 2 года назад +9

      totally! I was watching the video and my reaction was "oye, pero así sí se entiende! :O"

    • @diogorodrigues747
      @diogorodrigues747 2 года назад +15

      As a Portuguese, I normally understand some words of Romanian that are very close to Portuguese and sometimes Romanian TV is actually surprisingly intelligible (or at least the newscasts), but in informal speech is quite difficult because they use lots of loanwords from Slavonic and Hungarian, and other Latin cognates that we don't use too.

    • @Pangui008
      @Pangui008 2 года назад +10

      @@diogorodrigues747 oooh, informal speech is the hardest one, always. Even for people who speak the same lang, when it's informal from another country is hard. Some Spanish speakers even say that in Chile we don't speak Spanish 😅(I won't try to argue 😅)
      That makes me wonder: is it easier for romance lang speakers from Europe to understand Romanian, even when controlling for the lang? (I mean, comparing French speakers from Fr/Ca; Portuguese speakers from Pt/Br; Spanish speakers from Es/Mx, etc.)

    • @LearnRomanianWithCorina
      @LearnRomanianWithCorina 2 года назад +7

      @@diogorodrigues747 Informal speech is always the most difficult, especially because a lot of times it doesn't comply with the standard, literary norms

    • @pxn748
      @pxn748 2 года назад +1

      Same here!

  • @ItsMikeLearns
    @ItsMikeLearns 2 года назад +53

    This is AWESOME! I am currently learning romanian! It so unique and beautiful and i love it

    • @craftah
      @craftah 2 года назад +6

      romanian sounds like russian + italian

    • @ItsMikeLearns
      @ItsMikeLearns 2 года назад +1

      @@craftah i agree! Its a really unique language. I enjoy learning it

    • @mojewjewjew4420
      @mojewjewjew4420 2 года назад

      @@craftah There is more to romanian than that, also latin with a slight slavic accent is more accurate.

    • @mojewjewjew4420
      @mojewjewjew4420 2 года назад

      @@ItsMikeLearns What do you like the most about it? Also do you speak other latin languages?

    • @ItsMikeLearns
      @ItsMikeLearns 2 года назад +1

      @@mojewjewjew4420 i am learning spanish and italian on the side! its great and i love it

  • @alexandruchiriac2179
    @alexandruchiriac2179 2 года назад +24

    actually, romanian has a “long infinitive” which adds that “-re” at the end! so “a avea” (to have) becomes “avere”, “a vedea” (to see) becomes “vedere” and “a auzi” (to hear) becomes “auzire”:) the grammar behind it is a little more complex but it does exist and it’s a form that’s closer to italian

    • @annaandrea8320
      @annaandrea8320 2 года назад +3

      The long infinitive suffered a conversion, it became a noun in Romanian. „Închinare-aș și n-am cui.”, „Fir(e)-ai tu să fii!”, „Dar(e)-ar boala-n tine!” are probably the only instances it has a verbal role.

    • @annaandrea8320
      @annaandrea8320 2 года назад +2

      @@ppn194, în limba actuală nu mai există infinitiv lung (cu rol verbal), ci doar substantivul provenit (prin conversie) din acesta.

    • @annaandrea8320
      @annaandrea8320 2 года назад

      @@ppn194 Funcțiile sintactice ale infinitivului:
      subiect, nume predicativ, atribut verbal, complement direct, complement indirect, complement circumstanțial de timp, complement circumstanțial de scop, complement circumstanțial de mod.

    • @annaandrea8320
      @annaandrea8320 2 года назад

      @@ppn194 Forma lungă, o formă folosită în limba veche, era obținută prin adăugarea sufixului „-re“ (a citire, a învățare). În limba actuală se folosește forma substantivizată a infinitivului lung (citire, citirea, învățare, învățarea).

    • @re_di_roma_is_back2388
      @re_di_roma_is_back2388 2 года назад +4

      @@annaandrea8320 Limba mi pare che è una parola usata anche in Sardegna.

  • @conradbo1
    @conradbo1 Год назад +2

    Great and very professional video. I really enjoy watching it.

    • @Langfocus
      @Langfocus  Год назад

      Thanks! I'm glad to hear that. :)

  • @AlexAlex-jk6uq
    @AlexAlex-jk6uq Год назад +4

    Nice video!
    There is something close for „belly button” in romanian, except „buric”. It is „ombilic” or „umbilic”, but we dont use it that much. It is more like an anatomic word.
    When you talk abt the romanian diacritics you forgot the „ț”. We use it for the „zz„ sound, like in „pizza”. :) For example, some words: măreț (grand), țigară (cigarette), țânțar (mosquito)...
    Since lot of romanian and moldavian people work in Italy, they need very short terms to learn italian language speaking form...like few months :)

  • @EinFelsbrocken
    @EinFelsbrocken Год назад +19

    Its crazy how over a millenia after the fall of the western half of the empire so many places still can understand each other.

    • @user-tr9fy3nl9yro
      @user-tr9fy3nl9yro Год назад +2

      Because Latin was an elevated language used in Middle Age scientific and cultural Europe by scholars like nowadays English, Latin language being consideted most advanced în comparison, in contrast with the other "barbaric" dialects.
      În 1940iest în nazi camps, doctors, priests, and other scientists, could understand each other în commune Latin.

    • @Bayard1503
      @Bayard1503 Год назад +1

      @@user-tr9fy3nl9yro But that has zero bearing on Romanian, Latin was not used or known in the area during the Middle Ages. The religious languages used were Greek and Old Slavonic all the way to the 19th century. Latin languages and dialects (and there used to be a lot of them in Eastern Europe) and their speakers were actually looked down upon in most places where they were in minority... they were mostly rural languages.

  • @silvestervanmeijgaarden5350
    @silvestervanmeijgaarden5350 2 года назад +9

    Hello Paul, I feel honoured to be one of the first to have seen this video within the first 40 minutes 😁 At the same time, I'm just really happy that you made this video because I've always been interested about seeing this actually being researched by a language nerd like you! 🤓🤩 Romanian and Italian aren't exactly like comparing Spanish to Portuguese and so on! 😃

  • @pretender2u
    @pretender2u Год назад +1

    Hi, the amount of research you have done is crazy. I'm a speaker of romanian, italian and french and you explained it perfect. Congraciulation.

  • @marcelbas
    @marcelbas 2 года назад +17

    I am a Dutch-speaking second-language learner of Romanian. I think the greatest similarities between Romanian and Italian are on the lexical-phonological level, as Romanian - like Italian - has kept most Latin words fairly intact. The lack of assimilation, metatheses, vowel changes and the retention of consonantal qualities have kept Romanian words fairly close to their origins. This has even affected loanwords, which were 're-latinised' or made to sound archaic in a way so as to fit Romanian phonology (such as pronunciation of final t in French 'salut', a in 'balena' (whale), v in 'consecvent' and names like Elveția).

  • @mickael1277
    @mickael1277 2 года назад +75

    Romanian preserved the Latin case system and grammar while the other Romance languages developed prepositions and dropped the case system entirely.
    This means Romanian is the closest language to Latin in terms of grammar.
    It's impossible to communicate the Latin vocative case in Italian, but when a Romanian hears "et tu brute" they know exactly
    how Caeser meant it(or Shakespeare rather).
    Other people who hear Romanian think it sounds closest to Latin. To me Italian sounds quite effeminate with its "o" endings.
    Romanian is the only romance language that still maintains a masculine and authoritative sound like Latin does.
    The case declensions in Romanian are inherited directly from Latin. Therefore, they cannot be "sooo different". Italian does not even have case declensions.
    It is so different from Latin that it is astounding that Italian as well as other western romance languages actually come from Latin.
    The "complemento di vocazione" in Italian is just adding "oh" in front of the nouns, much like in English.
    But this is not how Latin functions and it doesn't really capture the mood of the Latin and Romanian vocative case.

    • @TruePathLiving
      @TruePathLiving Год назад +3

      Amen !

    • @amjan
      @amjan Год назад +1

      Great insight, thanks!

    • @silvanoragozza656
      @silvanoragozza656 Год назад +1

      Italian keeps a declension in personal pronouns, like "io, me, mi", "tu, te, ti",: "egli, lui, lo, gli"

  • @Bladavia
    @Bladavia 2 года назад +22

    Damn, even as a french speaker I can almost understand everything in both languages, at least the text. I knew about Italian but I didn't know Romanian was that close to other romance languages.

  • @IngridSchwaegermann-d1p
    @IngridSchwaegermann-d1p Год назад +2

    Wow, one can almost get dizzy by listening to this very intricate presentation on the differences and similarities of Italian and Romanian. As a long distance operator in Munich, we had to learn conversational Italian, since the Munich office mostly worked with Italy. Our teacher, Dr. Glauco Boico, came from Fiume/Rijeka in Croatia who spoke Italian with a Venetian accent. Italian is very easy, it just falls out of your mouth. As a previously apprenticed bookseller, I eventually returned to my own occupational field and once worked at a bookstore that imported books and periodicals from the East block countries and sold them to American universities. While I mainly worked on imports from Yugoslavia, I also had a chance to look at Romanian periodicals and saw that this language must be somewhat close to Italian. If one keeps one's ears and one's mind open, one can learn a great deal over the years.

  • @TacticusPrime
    @TacticusPrime 2 года назад +92

    It feels like Romanian and Italian are just on the far side of mutual comprehension, while Malaysian and Indonesian (two languages that I'm more familiar with) are just on the near side.

    • @bramantyoprahoro7284
      @bramantyoprahoro7284 2 года назад

      Both of Malaysian and Indonesian understand to each other despite a few differences.

    • @wyqtor
      @wyqtor 2 года назад +31

      It's also asymmetrical intelligibility, we Romanians do much better understanding Italian than vice-versa, because for every Slavic word we usually have a Latin-derived neologism that most of us know and which is similar to the Italian equivalent. But Italians don't have any kind of Slavic vocabulary to help them understand colloquial Romanian.

    • @bramantyoprahoro7284
      @bramantyoprahoro7284 2 года назад

      @@wyqtor What about regional languages in Italy (Dialetti) and Limba Sarda Communa (Sardinia)?

    • @TGDCChannel
      @TGDCChannel 2 года назад +3

      @@bramantyoprahoro7284 Malaysian and Indonesian is the same language

    • @wiseSYW
      @wiseSYW 2 года назад +1

      @@TGDCChannel formal talk still have similarities, but day-to-day talk? udah ngga lagi

  • @mauriziomonge
    @mauriziomonge 2 года назад +10

    10:52 - Romanian's "fost" is also related to Italian's "Passato Remoto" (~=simple past) form which is "fosti", which is however referring to ancient past, and not very used in spoken language and somewhat archaic. Source: I'm Italian.

    • @Vercixx
      @Vercixx 2 года назад +2

      "Considerate la vostra semenza: fatti non *foste* a viver come bruti, ma per seguir virtute e canoscenza"

    • @mauriziomonge
      @mauriziomonge 2 года назад +2

      @@Vercixx correct, "foste" being the plural (voi = yall), "fosti" (tu = you singular)

  • @manueldl9753
    @manueldl9753 2 года назад +22

    As an Italian I went to Bucarest and understood like 60% of the signs and 30% of the spoken language.

  • @christinefischer2137
    @christinefischer2137 2 года назад +1

    back here, and it was a joy again. you have a way of putting so much info in these videos, and the other thing i like is how you explain how cognates develop. knowledge about this helps so much to remember vocabulary.

  • @joseangellopezpelegrin9095
    @joseangellopezpelegrin9095 2 года назад +52

    What I am most impressive with, its how Romanians who emigrated to my homeland "Spain" are such good at adapting themselves to the language in a blink of an eye. Some of them I have met through all this years sound so native, that I could never imagine they were from Romania.
    🇪🇸 Las lenguas romances son únicas, 🇷🇴 Limbile romanice sunt unice, 🇮🇹 Le lingue romanze sono uniche, 🇵🇹 As línguas românicas são únicas, 🇫🇷 Le langue romanes sont uniques

    • @camelianedelcu5640
      @camelianedelcu5640 Год назад +2

      Esatto=exact,bravo hai dimostrato la somiglianza tra tutte queste lingue🙆‍♀️🌺👋

    • @_JOJ_
      @_JOJ_ Год назад +4

      Spanish and Italian are quite easy for us i would say, Portugese is hard to understand when someone speaks it but is easy to read. French... it takes practice... for me at least French is quite hard, sometimes it feels like it isn't even latin based. 😅

    • @_Amarin
      @_Amarin Год назад

      It's probably because we watched a lot of spanish language telenovelas when we were younger😂😂😂😂

    • @HotaruDS
      @HotaruDS Год назад

      In Romania, most of the people, under 50, speak multiple languages. 2 or 3 minimum. I have had colleagues in Romania that spoke fluently 5 languages, including romanian.

  • @andico6614
    @andico6614 2 года назад +7

    Buna Paul! I am impresed that you took the time to compare the languages and study them in order to make this informative video. I am Romanian, and I would say I understand most of Italian words. Sometimes even when I dont understand the all the words I can catch whats being said through context.
    It is clear that we are the far away cousin of Romance but I think we have enough similarities to understand each other. 🇷🇴 ❤🇮🇹

  • @sceart2011
    @sceart2011 2 года назад +50

    Da italiano che studia romeno la maggiori difficoltà all'inizio sono l'uso dei casi e le parole di origine non latina. Però una volta appresi questi meccanismi sia la comprensione che la lettura risultano facili.

    • @dacius3094
      @dacius3094 2 года назад +15

      Sunt Român și am înțeles 100% din ce ai scris 😸 🇷🇴🤝🇮🇹 frați latini

    • @adamhau9336
      @adamhau9336 2 года назад +5

      Nunca he aprendido el italiano de forma seria pero por alguna razón puedo entender lo que dices. ¡Que extraño! Tal vez es igual para ti cuando lees un texto de rumano si?

    • @deacudaniel1635
      @deacudaniel1635 2 года назад +3

      I can understand every word here, as a Romanian.Btw there are actually 5 cases, not 3.Paul interpreted them as 3 because some cases have the same basic form.

    • @davlmt
      @davlmt 2 года назад +1

      As a French guy who knows Spanish I can understand most written Italian but not nearly as much Romanian by far

    • @giannifois8948
      @giannifois8948 2 года назад +5

      Da persona che impara greco antico e latino a scuola da tre anni, il sistema dei casi mi è ormai proprio

  • @paulmedeiros8567
    @paulmedeiros8567 Год назад +4

    Another great video, Paul! I think that it would be equally interesting to compare Romanian to Portuguese. There are many similarities, often appearing in the linguistic features where Italian and Romanian differ. 😊