Sibilinguae English
Welcome to the English version of
" Sibilinguae"
The blog of non tonal whistled languages
about all they have in common,
their past, present and future
First of all, who we are .....:
We are native speakers of Béarnais, the language of the Bearn region, in the western Pyrenees. We are commited to maintaining the vitality of our cultural and linguistic heritage .
Our Ossau valley is rich in pastoral traditions, folk dances and songs. People from the village of Aas, looking out over the valley, whistled to communicate in Béarnais, just as the inhabitants of La Gomera (the Canaries), Antia (Evia, Greece) and the valley of Kuskoy <the village of birds> in Turkey still whistle their own languages today.
Our project is to exploit the few recordings (*) made at Aas in the sixties to revive the know-how of the whistled communication in Béarnais . The specificity of our approach is in using a Participatory Action Research process.
(*) = please wait +++
We have had the good fortune to receive support and help from specialists who did field research at Aas in the late sixties
René Guy Busnel and
Bernard Gautheron ( Paris III - Sorbonne Nouvelle)
as well as from
Julien Meyer , Université de Lyon II
who has been studying whistled languages worldwide
Our friends in La Gomera Don Isidro Ortiz and Don Eugenio Darias have offered their support to enable us to overcome any difficulties encountered . Their skills as experts in "silbo" and as authorities in teaching it are a very precious resource
We may take advantage of the skills of the Canarian Whistlers (*), because béarnais language is very close to spanish.
On September 2011 , our first whistler visited Don Isidro Ortiz on La Gomera ( Canary Islands) for a one-to-one workshop.
Contribute your opinions and ideas on our forum , and urge us on :
" Siulaires , Aban !"
" On the road to success ! Whistlers "
Meeting with whistling shepherds
of High-Atlas, Morroco, August 2013
Listening to a whistled dialogue: - May 2012 Conservatoire de Musique de Pau
Understanding a whistled dialogue: - May 2012 Conservatoire de Musique de Pau
Broadcast "Lo Siular d'Aas" on Radio France Bleu Béarn March 2012
meeting 25 September 2011 on La Gomera ( Canary Islands)
A whistler from the Pyrenees with Don Isidro Ortiz
interview : Pierre Vidal & Bernard Gautheron 2007
Field research : Bernard Gautheron on la Gomera
Listen to wistled poems
listen to sentences in whistled bearnais
listen to words in whistled greek
listen to expressions in whistled turkish
Compare these 3 whistled languages