Twisted Tale of European Languages
About 46 million people in the European Union speak languages that are not majority tongues in their countries, ranging from Swedish speakers in Finland to users of Sorbic, a Slavonic language spoken by 60,000 people in eastern Germany.
Across the continent -- including non-EU countries -- more than 90 minority languages are spoken.
Some are majority languages in neighboring countries, such as French and Italian in Switzerland, German in France and Italy, Hungarian in Romania, and Russian in the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.
Others have no national home, including Basque and Galician in Spain, Breton in France, Sami in the Nordic countries and Russia, Romansch in Switzerland, and Scottish Gaelic and Welsh in Britain.
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