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Language Trivia
Visit this page regularly to keep updated on all sorts of interesting details, petty facts and the like on languages and language use. Word of the month, puzzles and games to keep you entertained or test your knowledge.
DID YOU KNOW?
The national anthem of the Netherlands is an acrostic. An acrostic is a poem or other form of writing in which the first letter, syllable or word of each line, paragraph or other recurring feature in the text spells out a word or a message.
From this anthem, called Het Wilhelmus, most Dutch people know to sing only a part of the first verse however as it contains as much as fifteen (!) stanzas.
The first letters of each of the fifteen verses represent the name "WILLEM VAN NASSOV" (old spelling). This was one of the hereditary titles of William of Orange (William the Silent), who introduces himself in the poem to the Dutch people.
OISEAU
It’s the shortest French word containing all five vowels of the modern Latin-based alphabet. Oiseau means ‘bird’
