The Village That Talks in Whistles
In a Turkish mountain village, people talk across valleys in 'bird language': whole conversations whistled.
What was reported
In Kuşköy, 'bird village', in the mountains above Türkiye's Black Sea coast, people have long talked across steep valleys in kuş dili, 'bird language': a whistled form of Turkish that can carry a kilometre or more.
As mobile phones spread, it began to fade, and in 2017 UNESCO listed it as heritage in urgent need of safeguarding. The village holds an annual festival and teaches it in school.
Explanations offered
A 2015 study found that whistled Turkish is processed more evenly by both halves of the brain than spoken Turkish, which relies mostly on the left. Like the whistled language of La Gomera, it maps the sounds of speech onto changes in pitch.
- When
- Used for centuries
- Where
- Kuşköy, Çanakçı, Giresun, Türkiye
- Witnesses
- Villagers in the Black Sea mountains
- Status
- Explained
Famous cases are real, widely reported events. Each file sets out what witnesses said and the explanations that have been offered, without taking a side.