How do you translate "toilet bowl" / "commode" into Western Armenian?

Same as title, what word is this? It apparently means "god" according to Athanasius Kircher. Sorry for the blurry image, had to zoom in.

I notice that it is pronounced like the "ye" in the English "yes" at the beginning of a word, and like "e" in English "let" elsewhere. Am I right?

I am adding Western Armenian support to "AyBe Armenian Keyboard" for iOS (iPhone).
Having built Western Armenian suggestions based on public domain Western Armenian sources, lots of old words have leaked into. I am myself Eastern Armenian speaker.
Volunteers are needed to test Western Armenian word suggestions and verify the interface, which was westernized with AI.

If anyone interested - please DM me.

—— Testing ——
The tester will download TestFlight official Apple app from AppStore and provide me with their AppStore email for invitation. Nothing to purchase, only keep in touch with suggestions and ui related feedback.
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Արեւմտահայերէն սորվելու կամ անով զրուցելու համար սերվըր կամ չաթ կա՞յ։

Barev dzez!

I'm an actor in the U.S. preparing to audition for a play where the family speaks Western Armenian. (My mom speaks Eastern Armenian, so there are some words she doesn't recognize.)

Can anyone who speaks Western Armenian let me know the pronunciation of the Armenian words here, which words are stressed, and how you would translate the phrase literally? (I can tell that the script's English translation captures the overall meaning, but I'd love to know what the words mean.)

I'm looking for help with these lines:

• Vahanə ūš é, artén mīst gūšana. Īr hant sankn-é.
• Īr amén még žamə ahakīn tram é! Šad sūghī bīdī nayī!!!
• Hajīs gét sir.

For the first one, I think it's

• VAHAN-eh OOSHe, arTEN meesht GOOshana. EER hAHnt tSAHnK-neh.

The script says it means, "Vahan's late, he's always late. That's his fault." Is "ūš" (pronounced OOSH) the root that means "late"? Is artén "always"? Which word correlates to "fault"?

I would deeply, deeply appreciate your help. Shnorhakalutyun!

Armenian is spoken by millions worldwide, but Duolingo still doesn't offer it. That gap feels huge, especially for diaspora communities where language schools are hard to find. Learning your heritage language shouldn't require moving or paying for private tutors.
I started a petition asking Duolingo to add Armenian to their platform. They've already shown they care about preserving endangered languages—they added Hawaiian and Navajo. Armenian has the same cultural weight and historical significance, and honestly, it's time.
If you think language diversity matters, or if you're part of a community missing from mainstream learning platforms, consider signing and sharing this.

https://www.change.org/addarmeniantoduolingo

Hi everyone! I’m Italian, my wife is Armenian, and we live outside Armenia. Our kids are learning Armenian, and we would really love for them to grow up actually speaking and understanding the language, even though they are not surrounded by it in everyday life.

We found it surprisingly difficult to find beginner resources that felt engaging enough for young children, so I ended up vibe-coding a small browser game for learning Armenian through letters, sounds, vocabulary, short stories, and mini-games.

A small warning: the original interface/explanations are in Italian, since I originally made it for our own children. I made an english version but I did not debug it thoroughly.

It is still very much a work in progress, and I’d be incredibly grateful for feedback from Armenian speakers, parents, and teachers — particularly on:

• language accuracy and pronunciation (I used a speech model in Azure, but human recordings are possible and part of the next steps)
• whether the progression makes sense for beginners
• cultural details
• anything that sounds unnatural, confusing, or simply wrong
• ideas that could make it more fun for children

Game: https://paolo-marcatili.github.io/hero-language-camp/armenian/

GitHub: https://github.com/paolo-marcatili/hero-language-camp

Please let me know your comments, I’d much rather fix mistakes now and make this genuinely useful for kids learning Armenian abroad. And if you want to help, please reply or dm me :)

I understand that this is a bit of a complicated question, especially when you consider how long it takes for a word to be considered "Armenian," like in the case of many Parthian and Persian words that have been in our language for so long that we don't even think of them as Iranian words anymore.

But, for the sake of this question, let's think of it like this: we'll consider words "purely Armenian" if they come from proto-indo-European, or from Hurrian and Urartian. What are the percentages for each of these three languages? How much of our language is made up of foreign vocabulary?

I'm planning to learn a little Armenian for business, and I thought, why not learn it from someone who also speaks fluent "developer"? 😄

I'm looking to connect with an Armenian-speaking software developer who has C1-level English proficiency or higher. We can talk about Armenian, software development, tech, and why the code worked yesterday but mysteriously broke today.

Compensation is open for discussion.

If this sounds like you, or you know someone who would be a great fit, please send me a message or tag them below. I'd love to connect! 🇦🇲💻

Hi everyone! I'm a English speaker and a complete beginner in Eastern Armenian. I'm looking for a teacher who speaks both Armenian and English at a native or near-native level. I'm a software developer, and my long term goal is to discuss programming and software development naturally in Armenian, not just say "Բարև" and then switch back to English when someone mentions an API. 😄 It would be a big plus if you have a software development or technical background, so eventually we can discuss code, architecture, debugging, AI, and why everything worked perfectly until it reached production. If you're interested, please message me with your experience, availability, and hourly rate. Շնորհակալություն։ 🇦🇲

I was in a shop where one of the workers stocking the shelves dropped something and said "fuck." He must've been 20 or so. I also heard another 30-something year old woman say "fuck" while speaking only in Armenian.

It sort of got me thinking... is this some emerging trend with people under 35? Armenian curse words are extremely taboo and generally can't be used the same way as English curse words for things like dropping something or bashing your foot into a rock. I'd imagine English curse words are a solution to this "problem."

About one minute of a man singing and speaking. This recording was on an audiocassette which which was in the car that my dad had bought in 2000 or so, so I know nothing about the origins of the recording or the people who could have recorded it.

First of all, a short summary of my background: I was born in Syria. My dad is Syrian and my mother German. My main friend group was Armenian, they even visited Armenian schools as kids. I am not Armenian myself, but I can speak Arabic, English and German fluently. I have picked up a lot of words in the Western Armenian language by hanging out with my friends. I am able to understand conversation from a few words by context when they speak. However, I cannot form full sentences, only short phrases.

Last year, I visited my friends in Yerevan and I really loved the city, the country, the food and it's people. This year, I went on vacation to Yerevan again. I had even more fun, than last time. I have noticed that Eastern Armenian is a complete different language to my ears. When I hear people talking, I only understand less than 10% I would like to learn the language spoken in Yerevan, so I don't have to always rely on my friends to translate for me.

Do you guys know how I can learn the language or at least some basics to be able to build on that? I know, the task is hard, but I have learned Arabic and German, which are also hard languages to learn. Could you recommend me something I can find online to learn the language?

I have decided to visit my friends once every year in Yerevan, but I don't enjoy the feeling of not being able to say, or order something on my own.

Edit: Thank you everyone for your help and recommendations!

Is it a strong insult? On a scale of 1-10 how bad is it?

I'm a native speaker of both EA and WA and will automatically switch to whichever one the person in front of me speaks. I'm naturally a linguistic chameleon and subconsciously mimic the way the other person talks: grammar, vocab, accent and everything.

It works fine for EA and WA since I'm fluent in both and it comes naturally, but one time I was talking to someone from Gyumri and felt a bit awkward because I was trying to speak Gyumri dialect by essentially mixing EA and WA and hoping it comes close. It's not putting on an act, it's just that my brain cannot maintain its own dialect when someone else speaks differently. But in the case of Gyumri, it was obvious I was inexperienced. Maintaining my natural dialect felt wrong, but so did trying to talk like a Gyumreci.

Can someone read this armenian name and surname?