넓지 않는 유럽에서 비슷하게 생긴 사람들이 49개의 독립국가를 이루고 사는 것은 무슨 이유일까? 아래 자료를 보면 알 수 있다. 독립국가들 대부분이 자신들의 母國語를 따로 갖고 있다. 안도라, 리히텐슈타인, 산 마리노 같은 小國은 인접한 大國의 말을 쓰지만 나머지 40개 나라들은 인구가 200만 남짓한 슬로베니아까지도 자기 나라 말을 유지한다.

유럽의 복잡한 國境線은 언어의 경계이다. 말이 다르면 생각이 다르고, 풍습이 다르고, 종교나 가치관도 다르다. 말이 國境線이고 말이 民族이며 말이 國家인 것이다. '國語는 祖國이란 말'은 결코 과장이 아니다.



*European Countries(Official and national Languages Other spoken Languages)

Albania Albanian (Shqip, Tosk (Toskë) is the official dialect) Shqip-Gheg dialect (Gegë), Greek, Italian

Andorra Catalan French, Castilian, Portuguese

Austria German, Slovene (official in Carinthia), Croatian and Hungarian (official in Burgenland)

Belarus Belarusian, Russian

Belgium Dutch 60%, French 40%, German less than 1%

Bosnia & Herzegovina Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian

Bulgaria Bulgarian Turkish

Croatia Croatian (hrvatski)

Cyprus Greek, Turkish, English

Czech Republic Czech (cestina)

Denmark Danish (dansk) Standard German

Estonia Estonian (eesti keel) Russian, Ukrainian, Finnish

Faroe Islands Faroese, Danish

Finland Finnish (suomi) 93.4%, Swedish 5.9% small Sami- and Russian-speaking minorities

France French (français)

Germany German (Deutsch)

Gibraltar English Llanito (a mixture of Spanish and English), Spanish

Greece Greek (elliniká, the Koine-Demotic version) Turkish (Northern Greece)

Greenland Greenlandic Inuktitut (Kalaallisut), Danish

Hungary Hungarian (magyar) German, Romanian

Iceland Icelandic English, Nordic languages, German widely spoken.

Ireland Irish (Gaeilge), English (generally used)

Italy Italian (italiano)

Latvia Latvian (latviesu valoda) Lithuanian, Russian

Liechtenstein German

Lithuania Lithuanian (lietuviu kalba) Polish, Russian

Luxembourg Luxembourgish (LÎtzebuergesch, the everyday spoken language), French (administrative language), German (administrative language)

Macedonia, Rep. of Macedonian 68%, Albanian 25%

Malta Maltese (Malti) English

Moldova Moldovan (virtually the same as the Romanian language), Russian, Gagauz (a Turkish dialect)

Monaco French Monegasque, English, Italian

Montenegro Serbo-Croatian (Ijekavian dialect - official)

Netherlands Dutch (Nederlands, official language), Frisian (official language)

Norway Norwegian (nynorsk and bokmal) small Sami- and Finnish-speaking minorities

Poland Polish (polski)

Portugal Portuguese (português)

Romania Romanian (romana) Hungarian, German

Russian Federation Russian

San Marino Italian

Serbia Serbian 95%, Albanian 5%

Slovakia Slovak (slovensky jazyk) Hungarian

Slovenia Slovenian (slovenski jezik)

Spain Spanish (español - the Castilian version) 74%, Catalan 17%, Galician 7%, Basque 2% note: Castilian is the official language nationwide the other languages are official regionally.

Sweden Swedish (svenska) small Sami- and Finnish-speaking minorities.

Switzerland German 63.7%, French 19.2%, Italian 7.6%, Romansch 0.6%

Turkey Turkish (türkçe) Kurdish, Arabic, Armenian, Greek

Ukraine Ukrainian

United Kingdom English Welsh (about 26% of the population of Wales), Scottish form of Gaelic (about 60,000 in Scotland)

Vatican City State Latin, Italian French and various other languages.