and more to come

Brian Micklethwait took a mess of pictures of the EU complex in Brussels. One that caught my eye shows the words “European Parliament” in eleven languages, leading me to ask myself what rule decided the sequence. It appears to be alphabetical by native name: Dansk, Deutsch, Elliniki, English, Español, Français, Italiano, Nederlands, Português, Suomalainen, Svenska. (Spanish and Italian are identical; Danish and Swedish differ by a hyphen. If such they are.)

Afterthought – what are the native spellings of Slovene and Slovak? I seem to remember that the adjective for Czechoslovakia was Československo. (The first letter of that word, in case your font lacks it, is C with caron.)

Later: My old friend Ulrika tells me svenska, not svensk. Is the Swedish word for language feminine, or what?

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