Bridge is a worldwide game. This also means that it’s a multilingual one to many partnerships and players – but language resources for bridge in other languages can sometimes be hard to track down. Here are some useful language resources for bridge when you need to know the translation of a term.
Names of Ranks and Suits in Different Languages
For any card playing linguist, this particular table is like walking into a candy store with a bag of money. Languages include Arabic, Bengali, Hupa, Irish, Tamil, Ukrainian, Hebrew and Yiddish. This is excellent as a fast, multilingual reference. Thanks goes to Ivan Derzhanski for setting this up.
Collins’ Dictionary of Bridge Terms
Let’s not forget English. Where you can find a copy, the Collins’ Dictionary of Bridge Terms is a good one – but for a faster reference than needing to grab a printed book to find a term, there’s also the ACBL Bridge Terminology page (Source: ACBL) and a very useful seven page term dictionary from No Fear Bridge (Source: No Fear Bridge).
Playing Card Names in Hindi
From Learn Hindi Free, you can find plenty of free Hindi phrases and lessons – including this list of playing card terms translated to and from English. Not as many bridge terms as I would have preferred, but nonetheless a useful resource.
Italian Playing Card Terms
Other than revealing some more about Italian culture and playing cards, there’s a handy side-bar here that translates some of the most common playing card names between English and Italian.
Afrikaans Bridge Terms
Lists of specifically bridge terms are especially hard to track down, with search engines showing a bit of a preference for general playing card lists in terms of ranking them. Bridge is a popular enough game for people who speak Afrikaans that this list of translated bridge terms was put together.
Playing Card Terms in French
From the channel “Learn French with Vincent”, here’s a short introductory video of playing card terms in French – especially useful because it can help you to get the pronunciation right too.
Dutch Words for Playing Cards and Dice
If you speak one or the other, you’re sure to notice that there are plenty of similarities between Afrikaans and Dutch – and although their histories are closely intertwined, they’re two separate languages entirely. (And many words, hilariously, are horribly obscene in one language while completely innocuous in the other…) Jokes aside, here’s a list of Dutch words for playing cards and dice.
German Card Game Terms
Looking for Deutsch terms instead? You can find some useful information about card games in Germany as well as the translation for the most basic of playing card terms at German Culture.
Spanish Lesson: Playing Cards
Uploaded by user “senorbelles”, here’s a short 2:40 minute video that runs through Spanish playing card terms. Useful, though brief.
Japanese Card and Board Game Terms
(Source: Self Taught Japanese)
Visiting Japan? Here’s a list of Japanese card and board game terms that can help you out.
Mandarin Playing Card Terms
Mandarin is one of the world’s most widely spoken languages – and if you want to learn a few basic phrases, why not start with playing cards as a concept you’re already familiar with?
What’s especially great about this link is the fact that it’s a podcast. Mandarin can be a pretty complicated language, and it’s best to hear it.
Alternatively, there’s also this link (Skritter Blog) that can teach you a few other board game related terms in Mandarin too.