What is Esperanto?

Esperanto is a constructed language that was created in the late 1880s by a Dr. L. L. Zamenhof.

It has a regular grammar and a makes use of the Latin alphabet (though it adds some letters with diacritics, such as Ĉ, Ŝ, Ĵ, Ĝ, Ĥ, and Ŭ). Many works of popular literature have been translated into Esperanto, and there is also a great deal of original work written first in Esperanto.

Quick Facts About Esperanto

  • Esperanto is generally estimated to have around 2 million speakers and 2,000 native speakers
  • The Duolingo Esperanto course has over 700,000 active learners from 3 languages (with more courses in development)
  • Famous Esperantists include Leo Tolstoy, J.R.R. Tolkien, George Soros, and multiple influential politicians

Famous Esperantists

Nobel Prize Laureates

Source of Nobel Prize Winners: https://www.stason.org/TULARC/languages/esperanto/10-Are-there-any-famous-Esperanto-speakers.html

  • Sir William Ramsay (1904 Nobel Prize in Chemistry)
  • Sir Joseph J. Thomson (1906 Nobel Prize in Physics)
  • Wilhelm Ostwald (1909 Nobel Prize in Chemistry)
  • Alfred Hermann Fried (1911 Nobel Peace Prize)
  • Charles Ribert Richet (1913 Nobel Prize in Medicine)
  • Daniel Bovet (1957 Nobel Prize in Medicine, native Esperanto speaker)
  • Reinhard Selten (1994 Nobel Prize in Economics)

Writers

  • Leo Tolstoy
  • J.R.R. Tolkien
  • Claude Piron

Others

  • George Soros, American billionaire
  • Pope John Paul II
  • Franz Jonas, President of Austria
  • Hanz Fischer, President of Austria
  • Willem Drees, Netherlands Prime Minister
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