These words often show up in searches, so I decided to make a table of translations. I had guessed that many of them meant either “bee” or “honey” because they show up frequently, almost every day. So just for fun, here are those two words in 45 languages.
Language | Bee | Honey |
| Arabic | نَحْلَـه، نَحْـل | عَسَل |
| Bulgarian | пчела | мед |
| Chinese | 蜜蜂 | 蜂蜜 |
| Croatian | pčela | med |
| Czech | včela | med |
| Danish | bi | honning |
| Dutch | bij | honing |
| Estonian | mesilane | mesi |
| Euskera (Basque) | erle | ezti |
| Farsi | زنبور | عسل |
| Finnish | ampiainen | hunaja |
| French | abeille | miel |
| German | Biene | Honig |
| Greek | μέλισσα | Μέλι |
| Hebrew | דְבוֹרָה | דבש |
| Hindi | मधुमक्खी | शहद |
| Hungarian | méh | méz |
| Icelandic | býfluga | hunang |
| Indonesian | lebah | madu |
| Italian | ape | miele |
| Japanese | みつばち | 蜂蜜 |
| Korean | 벌 | 꿀 |
| Lithuanian | bitė | medus |
| Latvian | bite | medus |
| Malay | lebah | madu |
| Norwegian | bie | honning |
| Nubi | duban | laasen |
| Polish | pszczoła | miód |
| Persian | زنبور | عسل |
| Pashto | موچی | شات |
| Portuguese | abelha | mel |
| Romanian | albină | miere |
| Russian | пчела | мёд |
| Shona | nyuchi | huchi |
| Slovak | včela | med |
| Slovenian | čebela | med |
| Serbian | pčela | мед |
| Spanish | abeja | miel |
| Swahili | nyuki | asali |
| Swedish | bi | honung |
| Thai | ผึ้ง | น้ำผึ้ง |
| Turkish | arı | bal |
| Ukrainian | бджола | мед |
| Urdu | شہد کی مکھی ، مگس | شہد |
| Vietnamese | con ong | mật ong |
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The Indo-European language that thousands of years ago formed the basis for modern languages from India to Ireland, obviously knew of bees because their word for bee “bhei” and honey “medhu” is the ancestor for so many of the words you list here. Medhu still exists in english as mead, of course.
In Icelandic, instead of “bÿfluga” it should be “býfluga” 😉 The pronunciation of “bý” is the exact same as “bee”.
HP,
Thanks! I corrected it.
In German it should be just Biene and Honig.
Don’t need to say ‘the bee” or ‘the honey’.
Helmut,
Thank you! I was wondering about that because in the lists I found, German was the only one that included the article. It didn’t seem right to me but having had only one semester of high school German, I didn’t feel competent to change it. I will do so now.
Anyone know where to find a beekeeping book in Farsi, please email me.
Bagshahi@gmail.com
Just for completeness you should probably (in your copious spare time—hah!) add English to that list.
[ducks and runs]
Roberta,
It’s hard for me to believe, but I never even noticed that omission. If I can figure out how I made that table, I’ll try to fix it.
We have noted that you do not have one African Language for bee or honey on your list. 🙁
Here are a few to start you off: Shona in Zimbabwe Nyuchi for bee and honey is Huchi. In Swahili spoken in Kenya bee is Nyuki and honey is Asali. In Sudan in the Nubi Language bee is Duban and honey is Laasen. Bee Beautiful. African Women in Beekeeping!
Thank you, Trish. That’s just the kind of help I always need. I updated the post to reflect 45 languages.