Local name: Esperanto
Language family: Constructed language
Native speakers: L2 speakers ~2 million (Ethnologue.com, 1999)
Script: A modified version of the Latin alphabet
Official in: Not official
Spoken mostly in: ~

In the late 19th century, the language situation in the world was different, and even in a Western context, there was no obvious world language. The Polish-Jewish eye specialist L.L. Zamenhof in Warsaw had a great idea, though, in order to facilitate communication between peoples: he designed a very easy-to-learn languaged which he called Esperanto (‘hope’). The vocabulary was based mostly on Romance languages, with some words taken from Germanic and Slavic languages. The structure of the language is however more of an agglutinating language, far from the inflecting Indo-European languages that contributed with vocabulary, but easier to learn fast.

Esperanto has indeed proved to be a language that could be learned easily (especially for people speaking European languages, because of vocabulary, but with the growing importance of English as an international medium of communication, Esperanto has not had much penetration outside circles of language enthousiasts and idealists.

Esperanto: “Norda Vento kaj Suno”
Speaker: Mateusz Age at recording: 28 (2009) L1 reference: Reader’s native language is Polish


Norda Vento kaj Suno disputis, kiu estas la plej forta, kiam vojaganto preteriris volvita en varma mantelo.
Ili konsentis, ke, kiu unue sukcesos senigi la vojaganton de lia mantelo,
tiun oni konsideru pli forta ol la alia.
Do Norda Vento blovis per ciuj siaj fortoj, sed ju pli li blovis, des pli la vojaganto envolvis sin en sia mantelo; kaj fine kompatinda Norda Vento rezignis.
Tiam Suno brilis varme, kaj tuj la vojaganto deprenis sian mantelon.
Tiel Norda Vento devigis konfesi, ke Suno estas la plej forta el la duopo.