List of tongue-twisters

Contents
1 List of tongue-twisters in English

1.1 Rhymes and poems
1.2 Phrases to be repeated rapidly
1.3 Other phrases

2 Tongue twisters in languages other than English

2.1 Consonant clusters in Slavic languages
2.2 Albanian
2.3 Arabic
2.4 Bulgarian
2.5 Catalan
2.6 Croatian
2.7 Chinese (Cantonese)
2.8 Chinese (Mandarin)
2.9 Czech
2.10 Danish
2.11 Dutch
2.12 Esperanto
2.13 Estonian
2.14 Finnish
2.15 French
2.16 German
2.17 Greek
2.18 Hebrew
2.19 Hungarian
2.20 Italian
2.21 Japanese
2.22 Korean
2.23 Latin
2.24 Lithuanian
2.25 Marathi
2.26 Norwegian
2.27 Polish
2.28 Portuguese
2.29 Romanian
2.30 Russian
2.31 Serbian
2.32 Slovakian
2.33 Slovenian
2.34 Spanish
2.35 Swedish

2.35.1 Dialectal

2.36 Tatar
2.37 Vietnamese
2.38 Võro
2.39 isiXhosa

3 External links

List of tongue-twisters in English

Rhymes and poems

Sarah, Sarah, sits in her Chevrolet.
When she shifts she sips her Schlitz,
and when she sips her Schlitz she shifts.
Betty Botter bought a bit of butter. "But," she said, "this butter's bitter! Missing image
Loudspeaker.png
Sound

 listen?
If I put it in my batter, it will make my batter bitter!"
So she bought a bit of butter better than her bitter butter,
And she put it in her batter, and her batter was not bitter.
So 'twas better Betty Botter bought a bit of better butter.
A canner can can anything that he can,
But a canner can't can a can, can he?
A certain young fellow named Beebee
Wished to marry a lady named Phoebe
"But," he said. "I must see
What the minister's fee be
Before Phoebe be Phoebe Beebee"

(This is a limerick that turns into a tongue-twister at the last phrase.)

How much wood would a woodchuck chuck
If a woodchuck would chuck wood?
A woodchuck would chuck all the wood he could chuck
If a woodchuck would chuck wood.
I'm not the pheasant plucker, I'm the pheasant plucker's mate,
And I'm only plucking pheasants 'cause the pheasant plucker's late.
I'm not the pheasant plucker, I'm the pheasant plucker's son,
And I'm only plucking pheasants till the pheasant pluckers come.

The most common mistake here involves a spoonerism of pheasant plucker and derivative phrases.

One smart fellow, he felt smart
Two smart fellows, they felt smart
Three smart fellows, they all felt smart
Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers
How many pickled peppers did Peter Piper pick?
She sells sea shells by the sea shore
The sea-shells that she sells are sea-shells I'm sure
A tutor who tooted the flute
Tried to tutor two tooters to toot
Said the two to the tutor
"Is it tougher to toot
Or to tutor two tooters to toot?"
A mother to her son did utter
"Go, my son, and shut the shutter"
"The shutter's shut" the son did utter
"I cannot shut it any shutter!"

Phrases to be repeated rapidly

Variants: Red leather, yellow leather; Red welly, yellow welly

Other phrases

Tongue twisters in languages other than English

Consonant clusters in Slavic languages

Many of tongue-twisters in various Slavic languages depend on long consonant clusters, which are misleading to non-native speakers. In almost all cases in clusters of more than three consonants there are schwa and similar short vowels inserted, even if native speakers are not really aware of them.

Albanian

The caricaturist caricaturates characteristic caricatures. (Coincidentally kari is the definitive form of a vulgar term for penis.)
The cup with a lid the cup without a lid
The hen of Lleshi laid an egg in a wool basket.
Fart priest in april, fart.
The old woman washed the tiles.
You don't have a passport.

Arabic

Bulgarian

(They say) the king Carl and the queen Clara stole clarinets from the royal clarinetists.

Peter knits a wattle-fence, weaves three times through. Weave, Peter, the wattle-fence.

Unkle Chochko's little red pumpkins.

Six bottles are being dried on six highways by six blowdriers.

Catalan

Sixteen judges from a court eating hanged man's liver

Croatian

Chicken cackels until /to the house/ it cackels.
One fish bites another fishes tail.
On top of the hill a willow swings.
Petar made a loop for Peter by the road, hundreds of times.
/Sitting is/ old cauldron-mender and his old cauldron-mendress (wife) and their two or three cauldron-menderlings (children)
Chirping chirping cricket on the knot of a black spruce.

The following is written with syllable accents although one does not normally write them down as they are usually implied by context. However, writing this sentence without accents would make it unintelligible.

/Up there/ /worse/ mountains are burning, than mountains are burning down there.

Chinese (Cantonese)

(known as 急口令)

The drunken soldier stopped and listened.
A rich woman carried her husband to Fu's mansion.
Go to the laboratory and press the emergency button, dig for the chicken, dig for the bone, and dig for the chicken bone.

Chinese (Mandarin)

(known as 繞口令)

Xi Shi (a famous woman) died at age 44.

The following is Lion Eating Poet in the Stone Den, a famous tongue twister written by Yuen Ren Chao. It is a short story written exclusively with various tones of one syllable (shi), and composed in the literary Chinese style.

石室詩士施氏，嗜獅，誓食十獅。氏時時適市視獅。十時，適十獅適市。是時，適施氏適是市。氏視十獅，恃矢勢，使是十獅逝世。氏拾是十獅屍，適石室。食時，始識十獅實十石獅屍。試釋是事。
Shí shì shī shì shī shì, shì shī, shì shí shí shī. Shì shí shí shì shì shì shī. Shí shí, shì shí shī shì shì. Shì shí, shì shī shì shì shì. Shì shì shì shí shī, shì shǐ shì, shǐ shì shí shī shì shì. Shì shí shì shí shī shī, shì shí shì. Shí shì shī, shì shǐ shì shì shí shì. Shí shì shì, shì shǐ shì shí shí shī shī. Shí shí, shǐ shì shì shí shī shī, shí shí shí shī shī. Shì shì shì shì.

The following tongue-twister is based on the fact that the word "four" sounds like the word "ten":

This phrase can be used to tell if someone is drunk or not:

Sì shí sì tǒu sǐ de shí shī zi
(Forty-four dead stone lions)

Czech

Stick a finger through your throat.
He doesn't get on with his sister.
The role of Lord Rolf was played by VL.
If Julie doesn't oil rails, I will oil them.
Three hundred and thirty three silver fire-engines were spraying over three hundred and thirty three silver rooves.

Danish

Red pudding made from stewed berries, served cold with cream

Dutch

The coachman cleans the stagecoach with stagecoach cleaner.
The cat scratches the woodcurls of the stairs with three dry cloths.
The clever barber cuts hair well, but the clever helper of the clever barber cuts hair more clever than the clever barber can cut it.
The maid cuts straight and the servant cuts crooked
Liesje taught Lotje how to walk along the long tree lane

Esperanto

Does she know if the slave steals the sceptre during this scene?
May a billhook serve thee to scoop out a Serbian deer's brain.

Estonian

Baker's ginger biscuit
Black cow's tail behind a white cow, white cow's tail behind a black cow.
Kabli's club
Procurator and stationmaster
A ghost with rubberboots haunted in the chest of drawers
The Jüriöö uprising, in the night of April 23, 1343 peasants in Northern Estonia rebelled against their Danish overlords and cleansed much of the country of the foreign rulers.
Blossom-time of an apple-tree is from the Jüriöö uprising until the Christmas Eve.
The hatch of the tunnel of ballistic trajectory
This word also is a palindrome.
Edge of a yard fence

Finnish

Risk of frost on low-lying lands
The thick-cheeked dog of the deacon of the rectory of Appila (a name of a place) ate a thick bean can.
Bean casserole of the deacon of the rectory of Appila (a name of a place) boils and bubbles on the oven.
The thick-cheeked dog of the rectory of Appila (a name of a place) packed up a travelling-bag and started running.
Fine piano
Gather up a full bonfire! A full bonfire? A full bonfire.
Kokko (a surname), gather up the whole bonfire! - The entire bonfire? - The entire bonfire. Now will you gather it up?
Lauri (a man's name) found a one ruble coin from the brink of a steep cliff.
Black cat's thick cheeks
The rectory's deacon's bean casserole boils on the oven.
The presidential couple is barbequing cholesterol-less Florida broiler.
The water pixie hissed in an elevator. (tease or practice for people with a lisp)
Are you coughing alone?
I twine an 'R' around a purline, I put the 'S' into the pocket. (Tease or practice for people with problems pronouncing 'r' or 's')
Idiot, don't hit, beer spills!

French

The wheel on the road rolls; the road under the wheel stays.
A hunter who knows how to hunt has to know how to hunt without his hunting dog.
Pope Pius' dad's pipe stinks.
If those sausages are good, these sausages here are also good.
Basket piano
Are the archduchess's socks dry or very dry?
If my uncle shaves your uncle, your uncle will be shaved.
I want and demand jasmin and daffodils.
Natacha did not tie up her cat, who escaped
A commissioned dragoon decommissione a commissioned dragoon.
I am an orignal who will never de-originalise.
Spock takes speed by intraveinous? That's stupid? Spock speculates and loses himself into sporadic melancholy.
The bastards dirty [make fun of] Solaar, this annoys me. But let them dirty this, bye!
Cooked fruits, raw fruits.
If six saws saw six cypresses, six hundred saws saw six hundred cypresses. (Was written in a Finnish book as "si si si si si si prä, si si sang si si sang si prä".)

German

The rattlesnakes rattled until their rattles began to sound exhausted.
The Fishers' boy Fritz is fishing for fresh fish.
Bride's dress remains bride's dress, and blue cabbage remains blue cabbage.
The driver of the Potsdam stage coach cleans the case of the Potsdam stage coach.
At the Potsdam boxing club, the boss of the Potsdam post bus is boxing. (almost works in English too)
The whiskey mixer (barman) mixes whiskey with the whiskey mixer (device). (The fun here lies in the most probable mistake: wichsen is a vulgar German term for "to masturbate".)
In a dense thicket of spruces, thick spruces are heavily napping. (German ficken means "to fuck" and Nichten equals nices - n<->f).
The chaplain is sticking posters made of heavy card to the notice board.
If flies fly behind flies, then flies fly after flies.
Bismarck bit Mark, until Mark bit Bismarck.
Two salesboys, who load crates for the chocolate shop, ask chocolate shop salesgirls to the dance.
This morning seven Schwabians have seen a yellow rabbit.
Those, who arrest those who steal the coals, earn a reward.
Ich sage Ihnen jenes, daß dieses "das, daß", welches das Kind geschrieben hat, richtig ist.
I tell you that, that this "that, which" which the child has written, is correct.
If you give Grandpa Opium, Opium is going to kill Grandpa.

Franconian Dialect

(High German): Ein Marmeladeneimerchen haben wir daheim auch.
(English): A marmalade can, we have at home, too.

Swiss German

The pope was late ordering the bacon-utensils.

Greek

A duck, but which duck? A duck with ducklings!

Hebrew

A gardner grew a cereal in the garden, a large cereal grew in the garden.
Sara sings a happy song.
A snake bit a snake.
I am not a procrastinator, I am a procrastinating woman.
A noblewoman put on a shoe, shut the door in her husband's face. (This is a game with the conjugation rules that allow to construct identical words (in spelling and pronunciation) with different meanings. Such twisters exist in Arabic too.)
This one translates words from English to Hebrew. Translating all the Hebrew words to English would give "She means she, and he means he, and who means who, and me means me." Each Hebrew word is pronounced like the English word of the next couple.
Acre was covered with dew, Safed was covered with dew too.
Variation: שלג (snow) instead of טל (dew). This is more of an ear twister, you are supposed to pronounce it with no spaces, leaving the listened to guess what the קוקוס and the פיקוס are doing there.

Hungarian

Five Turks are massaging five Greeks amid everlasting delights.
What are you frying, little furrier? Are you frying salted meat, little furrier?
Did you do this pretended act? You, doer of pretended acts, you!
Two bakers are asking for two nice blue pictures.
Not all kinds of magpies have motley tails, only motley kind of magpies have motley tails.
(approximate) For the impossibility of ye committing multiple acts of desecration.
(tentative) Unmightfulnessliyourslidownbefallingsly
A pile of bald maggots and another pile of bald maggots make two piles of bald maggots.
Jamaica belongs to Jamaicans.
The rail-polisher of Sechuan polishes rails in Sechuan.
Linoleuming Lenin's Mausoleum.
The priest of Ibafa has a wooden pipe, so the priestly pipe of Ibafa is a priestly wooden pipe.

Italian

A piece of pizza that stinks in the well of the ragged fool.
On the bench, the goat lives, under the bench the goat dies
Apelle, son of Apollo, made a ball out of chicken skin. All the fishes came to the surface to see the ball made of chicken skin by Apelle, son of Apollo.
Three tigers against three tigers ... (ad nauseam)

Milan dialect

You, who's job is to stick on heels (to a shoe), stick my heels on! I should stick the heels for you? Stick your own heels since you stick heels on

Japanese

Bus gas explosion
Tokyo Patents Licensing Office (No such office exists.)
Your company's reporter is returning to office by steam train.
Raw wheat, raw rice, raw egg.
There are two chickens in the garden
Next door's guest often eats persimmons.
The junior priest drew a picture of a junior priest on the screen very well.

Korean

The manager of the soy sauce factory is Manager Jang and the manager of the soy paste factory is Manager Gang.
The police headquarters' iron window bar (has) single-layer iron bars; the public prosecutor's office's iron window bar (has) double-layered iron bars.

Latin

Are we sinking?
O you tyrant, Titus Tatius; such things you made happen! (By the poet Ennius)
If you go with the Jesuits, you are not going with Jesus.
I will destroy you, Rome, with my bare hands, arm yourselves and hide!

Lithuanian

Six geese with six goslings
Good guys in good forest drank good kvass while praising it.

Marathi

Cooked lentil wafer, raw lentil wafer

Norwegian

Brave dwarf mountain birch
The redcurrant bushes of Ibsen and other bushy trees
Wall board, ceiling board, wallpaper
Unpopped popcorn, cardboard and paper

Polish

Polish tongue-twisters
Original Translation Example Notes
W Szczebrzeszynie chrząszcz brzmi w trzcinie
I Szczebrzeszyn z tego słynie. 		In [the town of] Szczebrzeszyn a beetle buzzes in the reed, for which Szczebrzeszyn is famous. listen 1
To cóż że ze Szwecji So what that it's from Sweden? listen
Ząb, zupa zębowa. Dąb, zupa dębowa. A tooth, a teeth soup. An oak, an oak soup. 2
Spod czeskich strzech szło Czechów trzech Three Czechs came from where Czech thatches are. listen
Szedł Sasza suchą szosą, suszył sobie spodnie. Sasza (name) was going along a dry road while drying his trousers. listen
Stół z powyłamywanymi nogami A table with legs broken out listen
Wyindywidualizowaliśmy się z rozentuzjazmowanego tłumu. We isolated ourselves from the enthusiastic crowd. listen 3
Król Karol kupił królowej Karolinie korale koloru koralowego. King Charles bought for Queen Charlotte coral-coloured corals. listen 4
Grzegorz Brzęczyszczykiewicz (a name) 5
Przyszedł Herbst z pstrągami i słuchał oszczerstw z wstrętem przeszukując otwory w strzelnicy. Herbst came with the trouts and he started to listen to calumnies while repulsively searching through the holes in the firing ground.
Czy tata czyta cytaty Tacyta? Does dad read quotations from Tacitus?

Notes:

  1. The most popular Polish tongue-twister, these are the first two lines from Chrząszcz, a poem by Jan Brzechwa, in which almost all of the consonants make some kind of buzzing noise. Often, only the first line is used, which is hard enough as a tongue-twister.
  2. In a fast speech the latter mention of oak soup (zupa dębowa) is often mispronounced as dupa, a slightly vulgar word in Polish.
  3. The phonemes themselves are not difficult to pronounce, but long words (the first one has 11 syllables) make accents rare, resulting in flat, accentless, robotic speech. Note, that it is much easier to read it, than to repeat it by ear.
  4. The k, r, and l letters are used as often in the full phrase as in the last three words of the English translation (which themselves work almost as well as in Polish).
  5. This is a fictitious though possible full name in Polish, from the 1969 Polish comedy How I Unleashed World War II (Jak rozpętałem drugą wojnę światową) directed by Tadeusz Chmielewski, where it was used by the main character to confuse Gestapo officers asking for his name. When asked about his birthplace he replied with gmina Chrząszczyżeboszyce, powiat Łęgołody (commune Chrząszczyżeboszyce in the powiat of Łęgołody), which is even harder to pronounce.

Portuguese

Three plates of wheat for three sad tigers
One tiger, two tigers, three tigers.
Three sad tigers triturate thress wheat plates.
The mouse gnawed the cork of the bottle of rum of the king of Russia.
The mouse gnawed the clothes of the king of Rome.
The mouse gnaw gnawed and, Rosa Rita Ramalho, of the mouse that gnaws laughs!
The sink drips, the young chicken chirps, drips the sink, chirps the young chicken, the young chicken close to the sink, the sink close to the young chicken.
The Pope eats the duck's crop.
Peter has the black chest. Black is the chest of Peter. Who says that the chest of Peter is not black, has the chest more black than the chest of Peter.
The top of Peter's foot is black.
Mason of the cathedral is the priest Peter here? - Which priest Peter? - the priest Peter Pires Pisco Pascoal. - Here in the cathedral it has three priests Peters Pires Piscos Pascoais. As in other cathedrals.
The spider scratches the frog, the frog scratches the spider.

Romanian

Six Saxons in six sacks

Russian

Sasha was coming down a highway and sucking on a bread-ring.
In the yard there is grass and on the grass there is firewood. Don't chop firewood on the grass of the yard.
Karl stole corals from Klara and Klara stole a clarinet from Karl.
Greka (a Greek) was riding across a river, and saw that there was a lobster in the river. Greka put his hand in the river and the lobster bit his hand.
Thirty-three ships tacked, tacked, but didn't tack out.
The cap is sewn noncapways. One has to re-cap the cap, to over-recap it.
Heron had been withering, heron had been pining away, heron kicked the bucket. Repeat quickly multiple times, with the emphasis shifting from the first word over to the second, the fourth, and the sixth.
"Tell me about your purchases!" "What about what purchases?" "About your purchases, your purchases, about your little purchases!"

Serbian

On top of a hill a willow swings.
White goat kid started to bark.
Have these opanci (kind of shoes) of yours been well soaked? Have your guests became jolly?
A Turk brat rolls a barrel; a Turk damsel pushes a barrel. Turk brat faster rolls a barrel than Turk damsel pushes a barrel.
Up there woods burn worse. (Each word is said with different tone, and that is tongue-twister. Further, as Serbian language has flexible word order, there are 24 combinations of the tones, each having different emphasis. It is not easy to say all 24 combinations one after the other.)
Supplied (This is actually not a tongue-twister for speakers of Serbian and similar languages, but is for speakers of languages which don't have words with what looks like six consonants together.)
Four jackdaw chicks, on chimney perched, chirp.

Slovakian

A little ball in a little hole - this is impossible for most Czech people to say correctly.

Slovenian

"A pedestrian (goes) over a driveway." If spoken repetedly, one gets lost in the flurry of "s", "sh", "ts" and "ch" sounds.
"A bumble bee" Pronounced as a single syllable, starting with "chm-", followed by an "uh" vowel, and concluded with "rly", where r is rolled and y is pronounced similarly as in the English word "yes". (not considered a tonguetwister for native speakers)
"The bumble-bee language" This is a made-up word, but it is perfectly understandable and pronounceable in Slovenian as "čmrlj" above, followed by two syllables: "shchi-na".

From Ježica over the road in Stožice to get flowers.

Marko is a personal name, komar means mosquito. If you repeat quickly you don't know anymore which one is which.

Spanish

The archbishop of Constantinople does not want to be the archbishop of Constantinople, and the archbishop who un-archbishop-of-Constantinople-izes him will be a good un-archbishop-of-Constantinople-ifier.
Three sad tigers swallow wheat in a wheat field.

(This is especially difficult for non-native speakers because of the pronunciation of the Spanish "r" and the sound of "tr" and "t". )

r with r cigar, r with r barrel, fast the cars go, through the rails of the train.

(This is especially difficult for non-native speakers because of the pronunciation of the Spanish "r")

"The mother and her daughter are on her way to attend a mass. The mother steps on straw; the daughter on straw steps." Devised to make the speaker say "la hija pasa pija" (the daughter passes pija; the last word being either an insult or a colloquial word meaning 'penis').
Over the triple trapeze of Tripoli there worked, trigonometrically switched over, three sad troglodyte triumvirs, afflictedly bumping into tripods, triclinia and other gear crushed by the terrible Trappist tetrarch. Probably by Ramón del Valle Inclán (?)
Maria Chuzena was repairing her hut's roof, and a roof repairman that was passing by asked her: "Maria Chuzena, do you repair your hut's roof, or do you repair another person's?" "I dont repair my hut's roof or another person's; I repair Maria Chuzena's roof," said Maria Chuzena to the roof repairman who was passing by.
Pedro Perez Pereira, a poor Portuguese painter, packs a few cups in a few packets in order to travel to Paris.

Swedish

Six salmons in a salmon-box
Pack daddy's suitcase.
Seven seasick seamen were cared for by seven beautiful nurses.
Seven seasick seamen on the ship 'Shanghai' washed seven shirts in the sea.
To pick peppercorns in a copper pan
"West Coastish" (The double occurrence of 'st' followed by consonant clusters containing hard k's make this very awkward to pronounce correctly.)
"Fly, ugly fly, fly! And the ugly fly flew." (Three rounded vowels, "u", "y", and "ö" occur in seven out of nine words, making it hard not to mix them up.)
Island, island, Grassy island, Grassy island's bride.
"Splinterless broomstick". The complex consonant cluster combinations usually makes the speaker end up with something like "squish squash".

Dialectal

(Standard Swedish): I ån finns det en ö, och på ön finns det en å.
(English): In the stream there is an island, and on the island there is a stream.

Tatar

Five cats at stove's head, five heads of five cats

Vietnamese

Pick/cut the vegetables and boil them.

Võro

To the silver heifer.
Midnight animal (human being or ghost who is active at midnigt).
Where is the pond where the frogs are?
The owl is crying in the willow.
The woodpecker is pecking the lime tree.

isiXhosa

The skunk rolled down and ruptured its larynx.

External links

See also: List of tongue-twisters, 1343, 1969, Albanian language, April 23, Arabic language, Bulgarian language, Cantonese (linguistics)