- What language do they speak in hell?
(upbeat music)
Hello, I'm Julian Northbrook from doingenglish.com
and today is the one thousand, seven hundred
and 68th Sunday, in a row,
that I have neglected to go to church.
And therefore it seems pretty likely that somewhere
there is a non-refundable, one-way ticket
going down under, with my name stamped right on it,
ready and waiting for issue,
upon my departure from this world.
And you know what they say, if you're gonna go anywhere
for any length of time, it's a good idea
to learn a little bit of the local language.
Which raises the interesting question,
of what language do they speak in hell?
Well, I did some research, and it actually turns out
to be a pretty tricky question to answer,
simply because the concept of an underworld
actually far pre-dates any religion as we know it.
But the earliest concept of a hell
actually appears in ancient Egyptian culture, and was known
as Duat, first referenced in the Book of the Dead,
dated around about 1550 BC.
This ancient Egyptian influence spread
to the ancient Greeks, who called hell Hades,
referenced around about 850 BC.
This then floated around for a quite long time,
eventually spreading to Christianity
around about 175 AD.
Quite a long time after ancient Egyptians
were already done with the idea.
So historically at least, and assuming that the language
of hell doesn't undergo the same processes of change
and decay as our terrestrial languages here on Earth,
we can hypothesise that they probably speak
ancient Egyptian or ancient Greek, down in the fiery pits.
But wait, because the first depictions of hell
as we know and love it today, didn't actually appear
until quite a bit after this.
First, in Dante's Divine Comedy,
dated around about 1300 AD, and then again
in Milton's Paradise Lost, of 1678 AD.
And although we hypothesise that they might
be speaking ancient Egyptian or ancient Greek down there,
well, Dante was Italian, and so it's quite possible
that they might be speaking Italiano
down there in the fiery pits of hell.
But then again, Milton was English, so perhaps
Satan has already done the sensible thing
and gone with the language of international business,
English.
This would be pretty great news for me,
'cause I already speak English.
But, I guess, just to be on the safe side,
I should learn a smidgen of Italian as well.
You, on the other hand, if you wanna be prepared
for your fiery descent down into the depths of Hades,
you would do well to work on your English now.
If you don't know how to do that, check out my book,
Master English Fast, an uncommon guide
to speaking extraordinary English.
This book will show you step by simple step
everything that you need to know
to master the English language, and speak it
extraordinarily well in the world of international business,
daily life, and perhaps, even the depths of hell.
There's a link in the description,
or head over to masterenglishfast.com.
You can read the first chapter for free,
it's available on Kindle, and some paperback,
and, regardless of how you buy it,
you get a complete audio version as well
for your listening enjoyment.
Right, with that ladies and gentleman,
go enjoy your Sunday roasts.
Get it?
Roast, hell, Sunday roast?
No?
It wasn't that funny anyway, I guess it depends
whether you live in a country that has Sunday roasts or not.
I don't, so I'm gonna go and enjoy
a nice bowl of Sunday noodles.
See you tomorrow, same time, same place.
(rock music)