#onomatopoeias

I came across this post on Instagram and thought it was juicy enough to make a post out of it!

One caretaker at an animal sanctuary asks the sheep how they’re doing and says they reply in Catalan. Here’s why:

The sound lambs and sheep make becomes the onomatopoeia “bee” /bέέ/ in Catalan, which resembles “bé” meaning “good”. In English, the conventional onomatopoeia for the same sound is “baa” or “meeh”.

Other interesting onomatopoeic contrasts would include the “woof woof” dogs make, which in Catalan becomes “bup bup” and in Spanish “guau guau”. Also to be pointed out is the basic sound of birds, which we say is “tweet tweet” in English while in Catalan it’s expressed as “piu piu” or “pío pío” in Spanish. This is where the expressions “No decir ni pío” (SP) and “No dir ni piu” (CAT) come from, meaning “Not making a peep”!