This is a list of notable people with a knowledge of six or more languages.
Deceased
Antiquity and Middle Ages
*
Mithridates VI
Mithridates or Mithradates VI Eupator ( grc-gre, Μιθραδάτης; 135–63 BC) was ruler of the Kingdom of Pontus in northern Anatolia from 120 to 63 BC, and one of the Roman Republic's most formidable and determined opponents. He was an e ...
(135–63 BC), King of Pontus. According to Pliny the Elder, Mithridates could speak the languages of all of the twenty-two nations that he ruled.
*
Cleopatra
Cleopatra VII Philopator ( grc-gre, Κλεοπάτρα Φιλοπάτωρ}, "Cleopatra the father-beloved"; 69 BC10 August 30 BC) was Queen of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt from 51 to 30 BC, and its last active ruler.She was also a ...
(69–30 BC), Queen of Egypt. According to Plutarch, Cleopatra spoke many languages in addition to her native language, Greek, including Latin, Egyptian, Ethiopian, Trogodyte, and the languages of the Hebraioi, Arabes, Syrians, Medes, and Parthians.
*
Al-Farabi
Abu Nasr Muhammad Al-Farabi ( fa, ابونصر محمد فارابی), ( ar, أبو نصر محمد الفارابي), known in the West as Alpharabius; (c. 872 – between 14 December, 950 and 12 January, 951)PDF version was a renowned early Isl ...
(870–950), Islamic philosopher. He was reputed to know seventy languages.
*
Frederick II (1194–1250), King of Sicily and Holy Roman Emperor. He knew Italian, French, Latin, Greek, German, and Arabic.
Modern age, pre-18th century
*
Mehmed II
Mehmed II ( ota, محمد ثانى, translit=Meḥmed-i s̱ānī; tr, II. Mehmed, ; 30 March 14323 May 1481), commonly known as Mehmed the Conqueror ( ota, ابو الفتح, Ebū'l-fetḥ, lit=the Father of Conquest, links=no; tr, Fâtih Su ...
(1432–1481), Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. In addition to his native language, Turkish, he learnt Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, Latin, and Greek.
*
Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I (7 September 153324 March 1603) was Queen of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death in 1603. Elizabeth was the last of the five House of Tudor monarchs and is sometimes referred to as the "Virgin Queen".
Eli ...
(1533–1603), Queen of England and Ireland. She is thought to have known English, Welsh, French, Spanish, Italian, Latin, Greek, and some German.
*
Athanasius Kircher
Athanasius Kircher (2 May 1602 – 27 November 1680) was a German Jesuit scholar and polymath who published around 40 major works, most notably in the fields of comparative religion, geology, and medicine. Kircher has been compared to fe ...
(1602–1680), German Jesuit scholar. He was said to know twelve languages.
*
John Milton
John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet and intellectual. His 1667 epic poem ''Paradise Lost'', written in blank verse and including over ten chapters, was written in a time of immense religious flux and politica ...
(1608–1674), English poet. He knew English, Italian, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, and to a lesser extent Dutch, French, Spanish, Aramaic, and Syriac.
*
Wojciech Bobowski
Wojciech Bobowski or Ali Ufki (also Albertus Bobovius, Ali Bey, Santurî Ali Ufki; 1610–1675) was a Polish, later Ottoman musician and dragoman in the Ottoman Empire. He translated the ''Bible'' into Ottoman Turkish, composed an Ottoman ''Psalt ...
(1610–1675), Polish musician held captive by the Ottoman Empire. He is said to have known Polish, English, German, French, Italian, Latin, Ancient Greek, Persian, Arabic, Hebrew, and Turkish.
*
Dimitrie Cantemir
Dimitrie or Demetrius Cantemir (, russian: Дмитрий Кантемир; 26 October 1673 – 21 August 1723), also known by other spellings, was a Romanian prince, statesman, and man of letters, regarded as one of the most significant e ...
(1673–1723), Prince of Moldavia. He spoke Moldavian/Romanian, Italian, Latin, Modern Greek, Russian, Persian, Arabic, and Ottoman Turkish, and had an understanding of French, Ancient Greek, and Old Church Slavonic.
18th century
*
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 18 ...
(1743–1826), third president of the United States. He spoke English, French, Italian, and Latin, and could read Spanish and Greek. He may also have had some knowledge of German.
*
William Jones (1746–1794), British philologist and jurist. He knew twenty-eight languages to varying degrees: English, Dutch, German, Swedish, Welsh, Russian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Latin, Greek, Sanskrit, Pali, Hindi, Bengali, Persian, Middle Persian, Zoroastrian Dari, Arabic, Hebrew, Syriac, Geʽez, Coptic, Turkish, Chinese, Tibetan, and the various forms of early Germanic preserved in runic inscriptions.
*
Giuseppe Caspar Mezzofanti (1774–1849), Italian cardinal. One of his contemporaries recorded that he knew seventy-two languages to varying degrees; another calculated that he knew sixty or sixty-one. Both agreed that there were thirty languages that he had fully mastered: Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Latin, English, Dutch, Flemish, German, Danish, Swedish, Russian, Polish, Czech, Illyrian, Greek, Romaic, Albanian, Ancient Armenian, Modern Armenian, Persian, Hungarian, Turkish, Hebrew, Rabbinical Hebrew, Arabic, Maltese, Aramaic, Coptic, and Chinese.
*
Carl Friedrich Gauss
Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss (; german: Gauß ; la, Carolus Fridericus Gauss; 30 April 177723 February 1855) was a German mathematician and physicist who made significant contributions to many fields in mathematics and science. Sometimes refer ...
(1777–1855), German mathematician. He wrote in Latin and could read Greek. In addition to his native language, German, he knew a number of modern European languages. At the age of sixty-two, he began studying Russian and mastered it within two years.
*
Jean-François Champollion
Jean-François Champollion (), also known as Champollion ''le jeune'' ('the Younger'; 23 December 17904 March 1832), was a French philologist and orientalist, known primarily as the decipherer of Egyptian hieroglyphs and a founding figure in t ...
(1790–1832), French Egyptologist. He knew Latin, Greek, Sanskrit, Persian, Arabic, Hebrew, Aramaic, Syriac, Amharic, and Coptic.
*
Helmuth von Moltke the Elder Helmuth is both a masculine German given name and a surname. Notable people with the name include:
Given name;
* Helmuth Theodor Bossert (1889–1961), German art historian, philologist and archaeologist
*Helmuth Duckadam (born 1959), Romanian form ...
(1800–1891), Prussian field marshal. He knew seven languages, but was habitually taciturn, so that he was said to be "silent in seven languages". Among the languages he knew were German, English, Danish, French, Italian, and Turkish.
19th century
*
William Rowan Hamilton
Sir William Rowan Hamilton Doctor of Law, LL.D, Doctor of Civil Law, DCL, Royal Irish Academy, MRIA, Royal Astronomical Society#Fellow, FRAS (3/4 August 1805 – 2 September 1865) was an Irish mathematician, astronomer, and physicist. He was the ...
(1805–1865), Irish mathematician. Encouraged by his uncle, he learnt many languages while still young, including Latin, Greek, Hindustani, Bengali, Marathi, Sanskrit, Persian, Arabic, Hebrew, Aramaic, Syriac, and Malay.
*
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882) was an American poet and educator. His original works include "Paul Revere's Ride", ''The Song of Hiawatha'', and '' Evangeline''. He was the first American to completely trans ...
(1807–1882), American poet. He knew Latin, Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, and German. He also had some knowledge of Dutch, Danish, Swedish, Icelandic, and Finnish.
*
Jan Prosper Witkiewicz
Jan Prosper Witkiewicz ( lt, Jonas Prosperas Vitkevičius; russian: Ян Вѝкторович Виткѐвич, Yan Viktorovich Vitkevich) (June 24, 1808–May 8, 1839) was a Lithuanian orientalist, explorer and diplomat in Russian service. H ...
(1808–1839), Polish-Lithuanian explorer and diplomat. He spoke Polish, Russian, English, German, French, Persian, Pashto, Kazakh, and Chagatai Turkish. He also knew the Quran by heart.
*
Solomon Caesar Malan
Solomon Caesar Malan (22 April 1812 – 25 November 1894) D.D., Vicar of Broadwindsor, Prebendary of Sarum, was a British divine, polyglot and well known orientalist whose fluency in language was legendary: English, French, Sanskrit, Arabic ...
(1812–1894), British clergyman. He was conversant with around eighty languages, including German, Spanish, Italian, Latin, Sanskrit, Hebrew, Arabic, Chinese, and Tibetan.
*
Otto von Bismarck
Otto, Prince of Bismarck, Count of Bismarck-Schönhausen, Duke of Lauenburg (, ; 1 April 1815 – 30 July 1898), born Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck, was a conservative German statesman and diplomat. From his origins in the upper class of ...
(1815–1898), Prussian statesman. In addition to his native language, German, he spoke English and French, and to a lesser extent Italian, Russian, Polish, and Plattdeutsch. He also had some knowledge of Latin.
*
Herschell Filipowski
Herschell E. Filipowski (1816 – 12 June 1872), also known as Tzvi Hirsh Filipowski (, ), was a Lithuanian-born British Jewish Hebraist, editor, mathematician, linguist and actuary.
Biography Early life
Herschell Filipowski was born in Virb ...
(1816–1872), Lithuanian-born British actuary and editor. He was conversant with Polish, Russian, German, English, French, Spanish, Latin, Hebrew, Arabic, and Chinese.
*
C. V. Runganada Sastri (1819–1881), Indian civil servant. He knew English, German, French, Latin, Greek, Persian, Sanskrit, Hindustani, Marathi, Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, Telugu, Arabic, and some Hebrew.
*
Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels ( ,["Engels"](_blank)
'' Richard Francis Burton
Sir Richard Francis Burton (; 19 March 1821 – 20 October 1890) was a British explorer, writer, orientalist scholar,and soldier. He was famed for his travels and explorations in Asia, Africa, and the Americas, as well as his extraordinary kn ...
(1821–1890), British explorer and writer. He knew twenty-nine languages and eleven dialects, including Greek, Latin, Italian, Spanish, French, Provençal, Béarnais, Persian, Sanskrit, Hindustani, Gujarati, Punjabi, Sindhi, Marathi, Telugu, Toda, Arabic, Somali, and Swahili.
*
Heinrich Schliemann
Johann Ludwig Heinrich Julius Schliemann (; 6 January 1822 – 26 December 1890) was a German businessman and pioneer in the field of archaeology. He was an advocate of the historicity of places mentioned in the works of Homer and an archaeolog ...
(1822–1890), German businessman and archaeologist. He knew eighteen languages, including German, Dutch, English, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Russian.
*
Pedro II (1825–1891), last emperor of Brazil. He spoke Portuguese, Spanish, French, Italian, Latin, German, Hebrew, and Tupi-Guarani, and could read Provençal, Greek, Sanskrit, and Arabic.
*
Pashko Vasa Pashko is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:
* Gramoz Pashko (1955–2006), Albanian economist and politician
* Josif Pashko (1918–1963), Albanian politician
* Walter Pashko (1930–2006), American painter
See also
* Pasco (di ...
(1825–1892), Albanian writer. He spoke Albanian, Italian, French, Greek, and Turkish. He also knew some English and Serbo-Croatian, and in his later years learnt Arabic.
*
Georg Sauerwein
Georg Julius Justus Sauerwein (15 January 1831 in Hanover – 16 December 1904 in Kristiania) was a Germans, German publisher, Polyglot (person), polyglot, poet, and Linguistics, linguist. He is buried at Gronau, Lower Saxony, Gronau.
Sauerwein w ...
(1831–1904), German translator and private tutor. He spoke and wrote twenty-six languages.
*
Pétrus Ký (1837–1898), Vietnamese scholar. He spoke eight languages and had reasonable competence in several others.
*
James Murray (1837–1915), Scottish lexicographer. He was familiar with a wide range of languages and dialects, including Latin, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Catalan, Provençal, Vaudois, Anglo-Saxon, Mœso-Gothic, German, Dutch, Flemish, Danish, Russian, Persian, Sanskrit, Hebrew, Syriac, Aramaic, Phoenician, and Coptic.
*
Naim Frashëri
Naim bey Frashëri, more commonly Naim Frashëri (; ; 25 May 184620 October 1900), was an Albanian historian, journalist, poet, rilindas and translator who was proclaimed as the national poet of Albania. He is regarded as the pioneer of moder ...
(1846–1900), Albanian writer. He wrote in Albanian, Greek, Persian, and Turkish. He also knew French, Italian, and Arabic.
[
* ]Sami Frashëri
Sami bey Frashëri ( tr, Şemseddin Sami Bey; June 1, 1850 – June 18, 1904) or Şemseddin Sâmi was an Ottoman Albanian writer, philosopher, playwright and a p ...
(1850–1904), Albanian writer. He knew Albanian, Greek, French, Italian, Persian, Arabic, and Turkish.
* Eduardo Toda y Güell (1852–1941), Spanish diplomat. He spoke seven languages.
* Emilio Kosterlitzky
Emilio Kosterlitzky (Russian: Эмилио Костерлицкий; 16 November 1853 – 2 March 1928) was a Russian-born Mexicans, Mexican colonel during the Mexican Revolution. He had also served in the Apache–Mexico Wars, Mexican Apache ...
(1853–1928), Russian-born Mexican soldier. He spoke Russian, Polish, Spanish, French, Italian, English, German, Danish, and Swedish.
* Arthur Rimbaud
Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud (, ; 20 October 1854 – 10 November 1891) was a French poet known for his transgressive and surreal themes and for his influence on modern literature and arts, prefiguring surrealism. Born in Charleville, he start ...
(1854–1891), French poet. He spoke and wrote five European languages: French, Italian, Spanish, English, and German. He also knew Arabic, Amharic, Harari, Oromo, and Somali, and may have had some knowledge of Argobba, Tigrinya, and a now-extinct language named Kotou.
* Robert Dick Wilson
Robert Dick Wilson, PhD, DD (February 4, 1856 – October 11, 1930) was an American linguist and Presbyterian Old Testament scholar who devoted his life to prove the reliability of the Hebrew Bible. In his quest to determine the accuracy o ...
(1856–1930), American Bible scholar. He learnt twenty-six languages and dialects, including Latin, Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Hebrew, Aramaic, Syriac, and Arabic.
* Nikola Tesla
Nikola Tesla ( ; ,["Tesla"](_blank)
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. ; 1856 – 7 January 1943 ...
(1856–1943), Serbian-American inventor. He spoke eight languages, including Serbo-Croatian, English, German, French, and Italian.
* L. L. Zamenhof (1859–1917), creator of Esperanto. He spoke Russian, Polish, Yiddish, German, and French natively or at a native level. He also spoke English, but not well. He knew four classical languages, Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic, and two constructed languages, Volapük and Esperanto, and may have had some knowledge of Italian and Lithuanian.
* José Rizal
José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda (, ; June 19, 1861 – December 30, 1896) was a Filipino nationalist, writer and polymath active at the end of the Spanish colonial period of the Philippines. He is considered the national h ...
(1861–1896), Filipino writer and nationalist. He spoke or could read Tagalog, Visayan, Ilocano, Cebuano, Subano, Malayan, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, French, Catalan, Latin, English, Dutch, German, Swedish, Russian, Greek, Sanskrit, Hebrew, Arabic, Japanese, and Chinese.
* Emil Krebs
Emil Krebs (15 November 1867 in Freiburg in Schlesien – 31 March 1930 in Berlin) was a German polyglot and sinologist. He mastered 69 languages in speech and writing and studied 120 other languages.Cecile und Oskar Vogt Archiv, Düsseldorf ...
(1867–1930), German diplomat. By the time he left school, he could speak twelve languages. In 1914, he calculated that he could translate to and from German in thirty-two languages. Later he was said to know sixty or sixty-five languages, including English, Dutch, Icelandic, Norwegian, Danish, Swedish, Latin, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Catalan, Romanian, Russian, Ukrainian, Polish, Czech, Slovak, Serbo-Croatian, Slovenian, Bulgarian, Lithuanian, Latvian, Irish, Greek, Albanian, Armenian, Persian, Sanskrit, Hindi, Urdu, Gujarati, Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian, Georgian, Basque, Arabic, Hebrew, Syriac, Assyrian, Babylonian, Sumerian, Coptic, Swahili, Turkish, Tatar, Mongolian, Manchu, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Tibetan, Burmese, Thai, Malay, and Javanese.
* Minakata Kumagusu
was a Japanese author, biologist, naturalist and ethnologist.
Biography
Minakata was born in Wakayama, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan. In 1883, he moved to Tokyo, where he entered the preparatory school '' Kyōryū Gakkō''. The headmaster of ...
(1867–1941), Japanese scholar. He could read eighteen or nineteen languages, including Latin, Greek, Persian, and Arabic.
* Rıza Tevfik Bölükbaşı (1869–1949), Turkish politician. He knew Turkish, English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Latin, Albanian, Armenian, Persian, Arabic, and Hebrew.
* Ahatanhel Krymsky
Ahatanhel Yukhymovych Krymsky ( uk, Агатангел Юхимович Кримський, russian: Агафангел Ефимович Крымский; – 25 January 1942) was a Ukrainian Orientalist, linguist, polyglot (knowing up to 35 lan ...
(1871–1942), Ukrainian scholar. At the age of twenty-five, he was proficient in seventeen languages.
* Sri Aurobindo
Sri Aurobindo (born Aurobindo Ghose; 15 August 1872 – 5 December 1950) was an Indian philosopher, yogi, maharishi, poet, and Indian nationalist. He was also a journalist, editing newspapers such as ''Vande Mataram''. He joined the ...
(1872–1950), Indian philosopher. He could speak, read, and write Bengali, English, and French; read and write Sanskrit, Latin, and Greek; speak and read Gujarati, Marathi, and Hindi; and read German, Italian, and Spanish.
* Harold Williams (1876–1928), New Zealand journalist. He knew more than forty languages, including Maori, Samoan, Tongan, Fijian, Ilocano, Russian, Ukrainian, Polish, Old Church Slavonic, Lithuanian, Latvian, Greek, Armenian, Persian, Sanskrit, Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian, Georgian, Turkish, Tatar, Buryat, Japanese, and Chinese.
* Hrachia Acharian
Hrachia Acharian ( hy, Հրաչեայ Աճառեան, reformed spelling: Հրաչյա Աճառյան ; 8 March 1876 – 16 April 1953) was an Armenian linguist, lexicographer, etymologist, and philologist.
An Istanbul Armenian, Acharian stu ...
(1876–1953), Armenian linguist. Among the languages he knew were Armenian, Greek, English, German, French, Italian, Latin, Persian, Sanskrit, Hebrew, and Laz.
* Martin Buber
Martin Buber ( he, מרטין בובר; german: Martin Buber; yi, מארטין בובער; February 8, 1878 –
June 13, 1965) was an Austrian Jewish and Israeli philosopher best known for his philosophy of dialogue, a form of existentialism ...
(1878–1965), Austrian philosopher. He spoke German, Yiddish, English, French, Italian, Polish, and Hebrew, and could read Dutch, Spanish, Latin, and Greek.
* Ho Chi Minh
(: ; born ; 19 May 1890 – 2 September 1969), commonly known as (' Uncle Hồ'), also known as ('President Hồ'), (' Old father of the people') and by other aliases, was a Vietnamese revolutionary and statesman. He served as P ...
(1890–1969), Vietnamese statesman. In addition to his native language, Vietnamese, he knew French, English, Russian, Cantonese, and Mandarin.
20th century
1900s
* Sukarno (1901–1970), Indonesian politician. He spoke Javanese, Sundanese, Balinese, Indonesian, Dutch, German, English, French, Arabic, and Japanese.
* Steven Runciman (1903–2000), British historian. He began learning French, Latin, Greek, and Russian at a young age, and later learnt Bulgarian, Old Church Slavonic, Armenian, and some Turkish. He may also have had some knowledge of Arabic and a number of other languages.
* John von Neumann
John von Neumann (; hu, Neumann János Lajos, ; December 28, 1903 – February 8, 1957) was a Hungarian-American mathematician, physicist, computer scientist, engineer and polymath. He was regarded as having perhaps the widest cove ...
(1903–1957), Hungarian mathematician. He spoke Hungarian, English, German, and French, and also knew Latin and Greek.
* Syed Mujtaba Ali (1904–1974), Bangladeshi writer. He knew Bengali, Urdu, Hindi, Gujarati, Marathi, Sanskrit, Persian, Pashto, English, German, French, Italian, and Arabic.
* Pent Nurmekund (1906–1996), Estonian linguist. He could read over eighty languages and could speak a great many of them.
* Muhammad Hamidullah (1908–2002), stateless scholar. He knew ten languages and published works in seven of them (Urdu, Persian, English, German, French, Arabic, and Turkish).
* João Guimarães Rosa
João Guimarães Rosa (; 27 June 1908 – 19 November 1967) was a Brazilian novelist, short story writer and diplomat.
Rosa only wrote one novel, '' Grande Sertão: Veredas'' (known in English as ''The Devil to Pay in the Backlands''), a revoluti ...
(1908–1967), Brazilian novelist. He spoke Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, French, English, German, Esperanto, and some Russian, and could read with the aid of a dictionary Swedish, Dutch, Latin, and Greek. He studied the grammar of a number of other languages, including Sanskrit, Lithuanian, Polish, Czech, Danish, Finnish, Hungarian, Arabic, Hebrew, Japanese, and Tupi.
* Kató Lomb (1909–2003), Hungarian interpreter. She spoke Hungarian, Russian, German, English, and French, and to a lesser extent Spanish, Italian, Polish, Japanese, and Chinese. She could also translate from Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Ukrainian, Czech, Bulgarian, Romanian, Portuguese, and Latin.
* Uku Masing (1909–1985), Estonian scholar. He reputedly knew around sixty-five languages.
1910s
* Hugh Nibley
Hugh Winder Nibley (March 27, 1910 – February 24, 2005) was an American scholar and an apologist of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) who was a professor at Brigham Young University (BYU) for nearly 50 years. He was a ...
(1910–2005), American scholar. He knew fourteen languages.
* Lyuba Kutincheva (1910–1998), Bulgarian traveller. She spoke Bulgarian, Russian, Romanian, French, Turkish, Arabic, and Esperanto.
* Enoch Powell
John Enoch Powell, (16 June 1912 – 8 February 1998) was a British politician, classical scholar, author, linguist, soldier, philologist, and poet. He served as a Conservative Member of Parliament (1950–1974) and was Minister of Health (1 ...
(1912–1998), British politician and classical scholar. He spoke English, German, French, Italian, Modern Greek, and Urdu, and had a reading knowledge of Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, and Welsh. Among classical languages, he knew Ancient Greek, Latin, Hebrew, and Aramaic.
* George L. Campbell (1912–2004), British linguist. He spoke forty-four languages and had a working knowledge of perhaps twenty others.
* Meredith Gardner (1912–2002), American linguist and codebreaker. He spoke German, French, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Lithuanian, and Japanese, and could read Latin, Greek, Sanskrit, Old High German, Middle High German, and Old Church Slavonic.
* Toshihiko Izutsu
was a Japanese scholar who specialized in Islamic studies and comparative religion. He took an interest in linguistics at a young age, and came to know more than thirty languages, including Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, Persian, Sanskrit, Pali, Hin ...
(1914–1993), Japanese scholar. He knew more than thirty languages, including Arabic, Hebrew, Turkish, Persian, Sanskrit, Pali, Hindustani, Russian, Greek, and Chinese.
* Aziz Ahmad (1914–1978), Pakistani novelist. He spoke Urdu, Persian, English, German, French, Italian, Arabic, and Turkish.
* Nabi Bakhsh Baloch
Nabi Bakhsh Khan Baloch ( sd, نبي بخش خان بلوچ, Balochi: نبی بخش خان بلۏچ) (16 December 1917 – 6 April 2011) was a research scholar and writer. He was termed as a 'moving library' on the province of Sindh, Pakistan. ...
(1917–2011), Pakistani scholar. He wrote in Sindhi, Seraiki, Urdu, Balochi, Persian, English, and Arabic.
* Henryk Szeryng
Henryk Szeryng (usually pronounced ''HEN-r-ik SHEH-r-in-g'') (22 September 19183 March 1988) was a Polish violinist.
Early years
He was born in Warsaw, Poland on 22 September 1918 into a wealthy Jewish family. The surname "Szeryng" is a Poli ...
(1918–1988), Polish violinist. He spoke Polish, English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese.
* Omeljan Pritsak
Omeljan Yosypovych Pritsak ( uk, Омелян Йосипович Пріцак; 7 April 1919, Luka, Sambir County, West Ukrainian People's Republic – 29 May 2006, Boston) was the first Mykhailo Hrushevsky Professor of Ukrainian History at Har ...
(1919–2006), Ukrainian scholar. He spoke twelve languages.
* Shūichi Katō (1919–2008), Japanese scholar. He spoke Japanese, Chinese, English, German, French, and Italian.
* Fazlur Rahman Malik
Fazlur Rahman Malik ( ur, ; September 21, 1919 – July 26, 1988), commonly known as Fazlur Rahman, was a modernist scholar and Islamic philosopher from today's Pakistan. Fazlur Rahman is renowned as a prominent liberal reformer of Islam, who ...
(1919–1988), Pakistani scholar. In addition to his native language, Urdu, he knew Arabic, Persian, English, German, French, Latin, and Ancient Greek.
1920s
* Pope John Paul II
Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...
(1920–2005), former leader of the Catholic Church. In addition to his native language, Polish, he knew Latin, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French, English, and German.
* Ahmad Hasan Dani
Ahmad Hassan Dani (Urdu: احمد حسن دانی) FRAS, SI, HI (20 June 1920 – 26 January 2009) was a Pakistani archaeologist, historian, and linguist. He was among the foremost authorities on Central Asian and South Asian archaeology ...
(1920–2009), Pakistani archaeologist. He spoke fifteen languages, including French, Tamil, and Turkish.
* Alessandro Bausani (1921–1988), Italian scholar. He had a good knowledge of as many as thirty languages, including Persian, Urdu, Arabic, Turkish, Indonesian, and Basque.
* P. V. Narasimha Rao (1921–2004), Indian politician. He spoke seventeen languages, including English, German, Spanish, and French.
* Max Mangold
Max Mangold (; 8 May 1922 – 3 February 2015) was a Swiss-German linguist and phonetician. He was born in the village of Pratteln near Basel, Switzerland and taught phonetics, phonology and linguistic theory at the University of the Saarland i ...
(1922–2015), Swiss linguist. He spoke almost forty languages.
* Christopher Lee (1922–2015), British actor. He spoke English, German, French, Italian, and Spanish, and had some knowledge of Swedish, Russian, and Greek.
* Michael Ventris
Michael George Francis Ventris, (; 12 July 1922 – 6 September 1956) was an English architect, classicist and philologist who deciphered Linear B, the ancient Mycenaean Greek script. A student of languages, Ventris had pursued deciphermen ...
(1922–1956), British architect and decipherer of Linear B. By the age of ten, he spoke English, German, Swiss German, French, and Polish. As an adult, he learnt Swedish, Danish, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Modern Greek, and some Turkish.
* Stephen Wurm (1922–2001), Hungarian-born Australian linguist. "He was a genuine rapid language learner, and before he was 40, was fluent in five of the Germanic languages, five of the Romance languages, three Slavic languages, in Arabic, Swahili, Turkish, Uzbek, Mongol, Mandarin, Tok Pisin, and Police Motu, and could get by in perhaps 30 other languages—over 50 in all."
* Jambuvijaya
Jambuvijaya (1923–2009), also known as Muni Jambuvijayji Maharajsaheb, was a monk belonging to the Tapa Gaccha order of Svetambara sect of Jainism. He was known for his pioneering work in research, cataloguing and translations of ''Jain Agam ...
(1923–2009), Jain monk. He could read twenty-two languages, including Sanskrit, French, German, and Japanese.
* Pope Benedict XVI
Pope Benedict XVI ( la, Benedictus XVI; it, Benedetto XVI; german: link=no, Benedikt XVI.; born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger, , on 16 April 1927) is a retired prelate of the Catholic church who served as the head of the Church and the soverei ...
(1927–2022), former leader of the Catholic Church. In addition to his native language, German, he spoke English, Italian, French, Spanish, and Latin, and could read Ancient Greek and Biblical Hebrew.
* Hans Eberstark (1929–2001), Austrian interpreter. He interpreted into English and German from Dutch, French, Italian, Spanish, and Catalan. He also had some knowledge of Portuguese, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Surinamese Creole, Haitian Creole, Papiamento, Yiddish, several varieties of Swiss German, Albanian, Hebrew, and Amharic.
1930s
* Barry Farber
Barry Morton Farber (May 5, 1930 – May 6, 2020) was an American conservative radio talk show host, author, commentator and language-learning enthusiast. In 2002, industry publication ''Talkers magazine'' ranked him the 9th greatest radio talk ...
(1930–2020), American radio host. When inducted into the army, he qualified for work in fourteen languages. He had some knowledge of twenty-five languages in total.
* George Fernandes
George Mathew Fernandes (3 June 1930 – 29 January 2019) was an Indian trade unionist, statesman, and journalist, who served as the 22nd Defence Minister of India from 1998 until 2004. He was a member of Lok Sabha for over 30 years, starting f ...
(1930–2019), Indian politician. In addition to his mother tongue, Konkani, he spoke Marathi, Hindi, Urdu, English, Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, and Tulu. He also knew Latin.
* P. B. Sreenivas (1930–2013), Indian singer. He spoke eight languages, including Kannada, Urdu, and English.
* Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou
Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou ( ku, عهبدولڕهحمان قاسملوو, translit=Ebdulrehman Qasimlû; fa, عبدالرحمان قاسملو; 22 December 1930 – 13 July 1989) was an Iranian Kurdish politician and leader. Ghassemlou was t ...
(1930–1989), Iranian politician. He spoke Kurdish, Persian, English, German, French, Russian, Czech, Slovak, Turkish, Azerbaijani, and Arabic.
* Jon Elia (1931–2002), Pakistani poet. He knew Urdu, Sanskrit, Persian, English, Arabic, and Hebrew.
* Corazon Aquino (1933–2009), former president of the Philippines. She spoke Kapampangan, Tagalog, English, Spanish, French, and Japanese.
* Kenneth L. Hale (1934–2001), American linguist. He spoke over fifty languages, including Spanish, Portuguese, French, Dutch, Irish, Polish, Basque, Turkish, Hebrew, Chinese, Japanese, Navajo, Jemez, Hopi, Oʼodham, Wômpanâak, Ulwa, Miskitu, Warlpiri, and Lardil.
* Madeleine Albright
Madeleine Jana Korbel Albright (born Marie Jana Korbelová; May 15, 1937 – March 23, 2022) was an American diplomat and political scientist who served as the 64th United States secretary of state from 1997 to 2001. A member of the Democratic ...
(1937–2022), former U.S. secretary of state. She spoke Czech, Polish, Serbo-Croatian, Russian, English, German, and French.
Post-1930s
* John Boswell
John Eastburn Boswell (March 20, 1947December 24, 1994) was an American historian and a full professor at Yale University. Many of Boswell's studies focused on the issue of religion and homosexuality, specifically Christianity and homosexuality. ...
(1947–1994), American historian. He spoke or read several Scandinavian languages, Old Icelandic, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Latin, Greek, early and modern Russian, Old Church Slavonic, Armenian, Persian, Arabic, Hebrew, Syriac, and Akkadian.
* Daniel Kane (1948–2021), Australian linguist. He knew English, Italian, French, Spanish, Latin, Russian, Chinese, Jurchen, Khitan, and Esperanto.
* J. Jayalalithaa (1948–2016), Indian politician and actress. She spoke Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, Telugu, Hindi, and English.
* Sergei Starostin
Sergei Anatolyevich Starostin (russian: Серге́й Анато́льевич Ста́ростин; March 24, 1953 – September 30, 2005) was a Russian historical linguist and philologist, perhaps best known for his reconstructions of hypothet ...
(1953–2005), Russian linguist. He spoke Russian, Polish, English, German, and French, and could read a further thirteen Slavic languages, as well as Chinese, Japanese, Dutch, Spanish, Italian, Latin, Greek, and Sanskrit. Through his research, he had some knowledge of a wide range of other languages.
* Shahab Ahmed (1966–2015), Pakistani scholar. He mastered around fifteen languages.
* Moses McCormick (1981–2021), American YouTuber. He spoke around twenty languages at a basic conversational level.
Living
Africa
* Peter Turkson
Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson is a Ghanaian prelate and cardinal of the Catholic Church who has served as chancellor of the Pontifical Academies of Sciences since 2022. He was president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace from 2009 to ...
(1948–), Ghanaian Catholic cardinal. In addition to his native language, Fante, he speaks a number of other Ghanaian languages, as well as English, French, Italian, German, and Hebrew. He also knows Latin and Greek.
* Dikembe Mutombo (1966–), Congolese former basketball player. He speaks English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Tshiluba, Swahili, Lingala, and two other Central African languages.
* Trevor Noah
Trevor Noah (born 20 February 1984) is a South African-born comedian, writer, producer, political commentator, actor, and former television host. He was the host of ''The Daily Show'', an American late-night talk show and satirical news progra ...
(1984–), South African comedian. He speaks English, Afrikaans, Zulu, Xhosa, Tswana, Tsonga, and some German.
Asia
* Lokesh Chandra (1927–), Indian scholar. He knows Sanskrit, Pali, Hindi, Avestan, Old Persian, Greek, Latin, French, German, English, Russian, Chinese, Tibetan, Mongolian, Japanese, and Indonesian.
* Jeong Su-il (1934–), Chinese-born North Korean spy. He speaks Korean, Chinese, Japanese, Tagalog, Malay, Arabic, Persian, Russian, French, Spanish, German, and English.
* Mickey Curtis
is a Japanese actor, singer and Media Personality. He was born to English-Japanese parents.
A pivotal figure in Japanese popular music, Mickey is considered one of the three big Japanese names in rock music, helping to popularize the genre in ...
(1938–), Japanese actor and singer. He speaks Japanese, English, German, French, Italian, and Thai.
* Levon Ter-Petrosyan
Levon Hakobi Ter-Petrosyan ( hy, Լևոն Հակոբի Տեր-Պետրոսյան; born 9 January 1945), also known by his initials LTP, is an Armenian politician who served as the first president of Armenia from 1991 until his resignation in 1998 ...
(1945–), former president of Armenia. He speaks Armenian, Russian, French, English, German, Arabic, and Assyrian. He also knows a number of ancient languages.
* Gloria Macapagal Arroyo
Maria Gloria Macaraeg Macapagal Arroyo (, born April 5, 1947), often referred to by her initials GMA, is a Filipino academic and politician serving as one of the House Deputy Speakers since 2022, and previously from 2016 to 2017. She previously ...
(1947–), former president of the Philippines. She speaks Tagalog, Kapampangan, Ilocano, Cebuano, Spanish, and English.
* Malcolm Ranjith
Patabendige Don Albert Malcolm Ranjith ( Sinhala: පටබැඳිගේ දොන් ඇල්බට් මැල්කම් රංජිත්) (born 15 November 1947), often known simply as Malcolm Ranjith or Albert Malcolm Ranjith is a ...
(1947–), current archbishop of Colombo. He speaks Sinhala, English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Tamil, and Indonesian. He also knows Latin, Greek, and Hebrew.
* Rambhadracharya
Jagadguru Ramanandacharya Swami Rambhadracharya (born Pandit Giridhar on 14 January 1950) is an Indian Hindu spiritual leader, educator, Sanskrit scholar, polyglot, poet, author, textual commentator, philosopher, composer, singer, playwrigh ...
(1950–), Indian religious leader. He speaks English, French, Sanskrit, Hindi, Bhojpuri, Maithili, Odia, Gujarati, Punjabi, Marathi, Magahi, Awadhi, and Braj, as well as a number of other Indic languages.
* Péter Frankl (1953–), Hungarian mathematician, now living in Japan. He speaks eleven languages, including Hungarian, Japanese, Chinese, English, and French.
* Kamal Haasan (1954–), Indian actor. He speaks Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, Telugu, Hindi, Marathi, and English.
* Shabnam Mausi
Shabnam "Mausi" Bano (शबनम मौसी) (''"Mausi" noun. Hindi - "Aunty"'') is the first transgender Indian to be elected to public office (MLA). She was an elected member of the Madhya Pradesh State Legislative Assembly from 1998 to 20 ...
(1955–), Indian politician. She speaks twelve languages.
* Naela Chohan
Naela Chohan (Urdu: نائلہ چوہان, alternative spelling ''Naila Chohan'') (born 6 May 1958 in Rawalpindi, Pakistan) is a Pakistani ambassador, artist and diplomat. As a seasoned and veteran diplomat, ambassador Chohan has assumed a le ...
(1958–), Pakistani diplomat. She speaks Urdu, Punjabi, Bengali, Persian, English, French, and Spanish.
* Prakash Raj (1965–), Indian actor. He speaks Kannada, Tulu, Tamil, Malayalam, Telugu, Hindi, and English.
* Hikmat Hasanov
Hikmat Huseyn oglu Hasanov (; born 1975) is an Azerbaijani major general, who is the commander of the 1st Army Corps (since December 2014). He is a laureate of the 3rd degree " For Service to the Fatherland" order.
Life and service
Hikmat Hasa ...
(1975–), Azerbaijani military officer. He speaks Azerbaijani, Turkish, Armenian, Russian, English, and Persian.
* Priya Anand
Priya Anand (born 17 September 1986) is an Indian actress and model who predominantly appears in Tamil films. She has also appeared in Telugu, Hindi, Kannada and Malayalam films. After pursuing higher studies in the US, she began a career in ...
(1986–), Indian actress. She speaks Tamil, Telugu, Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Spanish, and English.
* Henrikh Mkhitaryan
Henrikh Mkhitaryan ( hy, Հենրիխ Մխիթարյան, ; born 21 January 1989) is an Armenian professional footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder or winger for club Inter Milan.
Mkhitaryan won four Armenian Premier League title ...
(1989–), Armenian footballer. He speaks Armenian, Russian, English, German, French, and Portuguese.
Europe
* John C. Wells
John Christopher Wells (born 11 March 1939) is a British phonetician and Esperantist. Wells is a professor emeritus at University College London, where until his retirement in 2006 he held the departmental chair in phonetics.
Career
Wells ea ...
(1939–), British phonetician. He studied Latin and Ancient Greek at university, and speaks English, German, Welsh, French, Spanish, Italian, Modern Greek, and Esperanto with varying degrees of fluency. He also has some knowledge of Polish, Russian, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, and Japanese.
* Werner Herzog
Werner Herzog (; born 5 September 1942) is a German film director, screenwriter, author, actor, and opera director, regarded as a pioneer of New German Cinema. His films often feature ambitious protagonists with impossible dreams, people with u ...
(1942–), German filmmaker. In addition to his native Bavarian, he knows German, English, Ancient Greek, Modern Greek, Latin, Spanish, French, and some Italian.
* Queen Silvia of Sweden
Queen or QUEEN may refer to:
Monarchy
* Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom
** List of queens regnant
* Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king
* Queen dowager, the widow of a king
* Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mothe ...
(1943–), spouse of King Carl XVI Gustaf. The daughter of a German father and a Brazilian mother, she speaks German and Portuguese natively. She also knows Spanish, French, English, and Swedish, and has some knowledge of Swedish sign language.
* André Rieu
André Léon Marie Nicolas Rieu (; is a Dutch violinist and conductor best known for creating the waltz-playing Johann Strauss Orchestra.
Rieu and his orchestra have turned classical and waltz music into a worldwide concert touring act. He r ...
(1949–), Dutch violinist and conductor. He speaks Dutch, English, German, French, Spanish, and Italian.
* Arsène Wenger (1949–), French football manager. He speaks French, German, English, Spanish, and Italian, and has some knowledge of Japanese.
* Ranga Yogeshwar
Ranganathan Gregoire Yogeshwar (born 18 May 1959) is a Luxembourgish physicist and science journalist based in Germany. He started gaining attention at the end of the 1980s in the Geographical distribution of German speakers, German-speaking are ...
(1959–), Luxembourgish physicist and science journalist. He speaks Luxembourgish, German, English, French, Hindi, Tamil, Kannada, and Malayalam.
* Johan Vandewalle (1960–), Belgian linguist. In 1987, at the age of twenty-six, he won the ''Polyglot of Flanders/Babel Prize'', after demonstrating communicative competence in nineteen languages (Arabic, Azerbaijani, Bashkir, Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, Kyrgyz, Persian, Russian, Swahili, Tajik, Tatar, Turkish, Turkmen, Tuvan, Uyghur, and Uzbek).
* Frans Timmermans
Frans is an Afrikaans, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Icelandic, Norwegian, and Swedish given name, sometimes as a short form of ''François''. One cognate of Frans in English is '' Francis''.
Given name
* Frans van Aarssens (1572–1641), Dutch diplo ...
(1961–), Dutch politician. He speaks Dutch, English, German, French, Italian, and Russian.
* Sigrid Kaag
Sigrid Agnes Maria Kaag (; born 2 November 1961) is a Dutch diplomat and politician, serving as Minister of Finance and First Deputy Prime Minister in the Fourth Rutte cabinet. She previously served as Minister of Foreign Affairs from 25 May 20 ...
(1961–), Dutch politician. She speaks Dutch, English, German, French, Spanish, and Arabic.
* José Mourinho (1963–), Portuguese football manager. He speaks Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, French, Catalan, and English.
* Ioannis Ikonomou (1964–), translator at the European Commission. He speaks thirty-two modern languages, including twenty-one of the twenty-four official languages of the European Union (the three exceptions being Estonian, Maltese, and Irish). Among the other languages that he speaks are Russian, Bengali, Persian, Turkish, Arabic, Hebrew, Amharic, and Mandarin. He has also studied a number of ancient languages, such as Old Church Slavonic, Classical Armenian, Sanskrit, Sogdian, and Assyro-Babylonian.
* Connie Nielsen
Connie Inge-Lise Nielsen (born 3 July 1965) is a Danish actress. She has starred as Lucilla in the film ''Gladiator'' (2000) and as Hippolyta in the DC Extended Universe, and in the films ''Wonder Woman'' (2017), '' Justice League'' (2017), '' ...
(1965–), Danish actress. She speaks Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, English, German, French, Italian, and some Spanish.
* Anatoly Moskvin (1966–), Russian linguist, arrested in 2011 after twenty-six mummified bodies were discovered in his home. He has studied thirteen languages.
* Mikheil Saakashvili
Mikheil Saakashvili ( ka, მიხეილ სააკაშვილი ; uk, Міхеіл Саакашвілі ; born 21 December 1967) is a Georgian and Ukrainian politician and jurist. (1967–), former president of Georgia. He speaks Georgian, Russian, Ukrainian, English, and French, and has some command of Spanish and Ossetian.
* Gianni Infantino
Giovanni Vincenzo Infantino (; born 23 March 1970) is a Swiss football administrator with Italian citizenship and the current president of FIFA. He was elected President of FIFA during the 2016 FIFA Extraordinary Congress in February 2016. H ...
(1970–), current president of FIFA. Born in Switzerland to Italian parents, he speaks Italian, French, and Swiss German natively. He also knows English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Arabic.
* Željko Joksimović
Željko Joksimović ( sr-Cyrl, Жељко Јоксимовић, ; born 20 April 1972) is a Serbian vocalist, composer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer. He plays 12 different musical instruments including accordion, piano, guitar ...
(1972–), Serbian singer-songwriter. He speaks Serbian, Russian, Polish, Greek, English, and French.
* Clarence Seedorf
Clarence Clyde Seedorf (; born 1 April 1976) is a Dutch professional football manager and former player. He is regarded by many to be one of the best midfielders of his generation.
Seedorf is considered one of the most successful players in UE ...
(1976–), Dutch former footballer. He speaks Dutch, English, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, and Surinamese.
* Richard Simcott (1977–), British language consultant. He speaks sixteen languages (English, French, Spanish, Welsh, German, Macedonian, Swedish, Italian, Serbian/Bosnian/Croatian, Portuguese, Czech, Catalan, Russian, Dutch, Romanian, and Albanian) and can use around fifty languages in total to some degree.
* Zdeno Chára
Zdeno Chára (; born 18 March 1977) is a Slovak former professional ice hockey defenceman. He played 24 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the New York Islanders, Ottawa Senators, Boston Bruins, and Washington Capitals between 1997 a ...
(1977–), Slovak ice hockey player. He speaks Slovak, Czech, Polish, Russian, Swedish, German, and English.
* Daniel Tammet
Daniel Tammet (born Daniel Paul Corney; 31 January 1979) is an English writer and savant. His memoir, ''Born on a Blue Day'' (2006), is about his early life with Asperger syndrome and savant syndrome, and was named a "Best Book for Young Adu ...
(1979–), British author. In his book ''Born on a Blue Day'', he states that he knows ten languages: English, German, Icelandic, French, Spanish, Romanian, Welsh, Lithuanian, Finnish, and Esperanto.
* Victor Bayda (), Russian linguist. He speaks Russian, Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Welsh, Icelandic, Swedish, English, Dutch, German, and French.
* Philip Crowther (1981–), Luxembourgish journalist. He speaks Luxembourgish, German, English, French, Spanish, and Portuguese.
* Mikel Arteta
Mikel Arteta Amatriain (born 26 March 1982) is a Spanish professional football manager and former player. He is the manager of club Arsenal.
Arteta began his senior career at Barcelona in 1999 but limited playing time led to a loan to Paris ...
(1982–), Spanish football manager. He speaks Basque, Spanish, Catalan, Portuguese, French, Italian, and English.
* Ivan Rakitić
Ivan Rakitić (; born 10 March 1988) is a Croatian professional footballer who plays as a central or attacking midfielder for La Liga club Sevilla.
Rakitić started his professional career at Basel and spent two seasons with them before he was s ...
(1988–), Croatian footballer. He speaks Croatian, English, German, French, Italian, and Spanish.
* Miralem Pjanić
Miralem Pjanić (born 2 April 1990) is a Bosnian professional footballer who plays as a midfielder for UAE Pro League club Sharjah and the Bosnia and Herzegovina national team.
Pjanić started his professional career at Metz being there for one ...
(1990–), Bosnian footballer. He speaks Bosnian, Luxembourgish, German, English, French, and Italian.
* Romelu Lukaku
Romelu Lukaku Bolingoli (; born 13 May 1993) is a Belgian professional footballer who plays as a striker for club Inter Milan, on loan from club Chelsea, and the Belgium national team.
Lukaku began his senior club career playing for Ander ...
(1993–), Belgian footballer. He speaks Dutch, English, German, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and Lingala.
North America
* Ivan Argüelles (1939–), American poet. He knows most of the Romance languages (including Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese, Catalan, Provençal, and Romanian) and a number of Indic languages (Hindi, Bengali, Sinhala, and Nepali), as well as Persian, German, Russian, Arabic, and some Chinese. He has also studied Latin, Ancient Greek, Sanskrit, Old Scandinavian, and Old Icelandic.
* Powell Janulus (1939–), Canadian court interpreter. According to the ''1986 Guinness Book of World Records'', he "has worked with 41 languages in the Provincial Court of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada."
* Stephen Krashen (1941–), American linguist. He knows English, German, Yiddish, Spanish, French, Hebrew, and Amharic.
* Steve Kaufmann
Steve Kaufmann (born 8 October 1945) is a Canadian polyglot. As of , he has an understanding of 20 languages, to varying degrees.
Background
Kaufmann was born in Sweden in 1945 to Jewish parents from the town of Prostějov in Czechoslovakia, n ...
(1945–), Canadian businessman. He has some understanding of twenty languages, although his ability to speak and write these languages varies to a considerable degree. Some of the languages he has studied are French, Spanish, Portuguese, German, Swedish, Russian, Japanese, Mandarin, and Cantonese.
* Viggo Mortensen
Viggo Peter Mortensen Jr. R (; born October 20, 1958) is an American actor, writer, director, producer, musician, and multimedia artist. Born and raised in the State of New York to a Danish father and American mother, he also lived in Argent ...
(1958–), Danish-American actor. He grew up bilingual in English and Spanish, and later learnt Danish, Italian, and French. He also has some knowledge of Arabic.
* Julie Payette
Julie Payette (; born October 20, 1963) is a Canadian engineer, scientist and former astronaut who served from 2017 to 2021 as Governor General of Canada, the 29th since Canadian Confederation.
Payette holds engineering degrees from McGill U ...
(1963–), former governor general of Canada. She speaks French and English natively, and can converse in Spanish, Italian, Russian, and German.
* Alexander Argüelles (1964–), American linguist. He speaks most of the Germanic and Romance languages (in particular, German, Dutch, Swedish, French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian), as well as Russian, Korean, and Arabic, and he has a reading knowledge of many more languages, such as Persian and Old Norse.
* Alberto Lati (1978–), Mexican sports journalist. He speaks Spanish, English, Hebrew, Portuguese, German, Italian, Mandarin, Japanese, French, Greek, and Zulu with varying degrees of fluency.
* Timothy Doner (1995–), American analyst focusing on the Middle East. He speaks English, German, French, Persian, Arabic, and Hebrew, and has some knowledge of a number of other languages, including Dutch, Yiddish, Italian, Latin, Russian, Croatian, Hindi, Pashto, Kurdish, Turkish, Indonesian, Mandarin, Hausa, Swahili, Xhosa, and Ojibwe.
Oceania
* Ghil'ad Zuckermann (1971–), Israeli linguist, now living in Australia. He can speak eleven languages, and has some knowledge of eleven more.
South America
* Pope Francis
Pope Francis ( la, Franciscus; it, Francesco; es, link=, Francisco; born Jorge Mario Bergoglio, 17 December 1936) is the head of the Catholic Church. He has been the bishop of Rome and sovereign of the Vatican City State since 13 March 2013. ...
(1936–), current leader of the Catholic Church. Born in Argentina and of Italian descent, he speaks Spanish and Italian natively. In addition, he knows Latin, and can converse in German, French, Portuguese, and English.
* Ziad Fazah (1954–), Liberian-born Lebanese language teacher, now living in Brazil. He is famous for claiming to speak more than fifty languages, and for a time was listed in ''The Guinness Book of Records''. It is unclear how many languages he can in fact speak.
* Andrew Divoff (1955–), Venezuelan actor and producer. He speaks Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, French, Italian, English, German, and Russian. At one time he also knew Romanian, but forgot it through lack of use.
* Sérgio Meira
Sérgio Meira de Santa Cruz Oliveira (born December 31, 1968) is a Brazilian linguist who specializes in the Cariban and Tupian language families of lowland South America and in the Tiriyó language in particular. He has worked on the classificat ...
(1968–), Brazilian linguist. He speaks Portuguese, French, Italian, Spanish, Romanian, English, German, and Esperanto, and to a lesser extent Catalan, Dutch, Russian, and Tiriyó. He can read with a dictionary Swedish, Latin, and Greek (both classical and modern), and has considerable knowledge of Volapük.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Polyglots
Linguistics lists
Multilingualism