tallar
“tallar” — to cut in Valencian. Verb, level A2, topic — food and drink. tuh-LYAHR: the double ll is ly. Tallar el cabell — to cut hair: the same word. La talla — the size, also from here. In a live sentence: “Talla la ceba a trossos petits” — Cut the onion into small pieces. You can hear how it sounds right here. One of 241 words in the set “food and drink” in the Valencian course.
In short
| Written in Valencian | tallar |
| Translation | to cut |
| Part of speech | verb |
| Level | A2 |
- tallarto cut
Why it looks that way
tuh-LYAHR: the double ll is ly. Tallar el cabell — to cut hair: the same word. La talla — the size, also from here
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- Talla la ceba a trossos petitsCut the onion into small pieces
Nearby words: food and drink
A menu, a market, a shop sign, the question “what is this?”. Food is the most frequent subject of the first weeks and the safest excuse to start talking.
- el cafècoffeeBoth the drink and the place. The article el tells you the gender — nouns are learned with it, like la taronja
- el teteaEl te with an accent is tea; te without one is to you. The pair works just like sí and si
- l'aiguawaterA feminine word that takes the el-article squeezed into l': l'aigua. The apostrophe is not decoration, it is required spelling
- el pabreadThe bakery is the fleca, a word Spanish has nothing like. Pa amb tomaca — bread with tomato — is the country's signature snack
- el formatgecheeseA cousin of French fromage and it sounds like one: for-MA-dje. The final t is barely heard
- la carnmeatMeat in general. The cuts are built by description: carn de vedella — beef, carn de porc — pork
- el peixfishThe x sounds like sh here: pesh. Fish in the sea is peix too, where Spanish keeps a separate word
- la fruitafruitA collective, so it stays singular: m'agrada la fruita — I like fruit. One piece is una fruita
- la pomaappleHence pomar, an apple orchard. New York stays la Gran Poma — the Big Apple
- la taronjaorangeBoth the fruit and the color: una samarreta taronja — an orange T-shirt. Valencia, the city that sent the word across Europe, is orange country
Test yourself
Five questions from the same set — “food and drink”. Recalling a spelling from meaning is harder than knowing a familiar word on sight, and therefore more useful.
- How do you say “to cut” in Valencian?
tuh-LYAHR: the double ll is ly. Tallar el cabell — to cut hair: the same word. La talla — the size, also from here
- How do you say “fish” in Valencian?
The x sounds like sh here: pesh. Fish in the sea is peix too, where Spanish keeps a separate word
- How do you say “water” in Valencian?
A feminine word that takes the el-article squeezed into l': l'aigua. The apostrophe is not decoration, it is required spelling
- How do you say “orange” in Valencian?
Both the fruit and the color: una samarreta taronja — an orange T-shirt. Valencia, the city that sent the word across Europe, is orange country
- How do you say “meat” in Valencian?
Meat in general. The cuts are built by description: carn de vedella — beef, carn de porc — pork
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “to cut” in Valencian?
«tallar». In a live sentence: “Talla la ceba a trossos petits” — Cut the onion into small pieces. You can hear how it sounds right on this page. Verb, level A2, from the set “food and drink”.
Why does this word look the way it does?
tuh-LYAHR: the double ll is ly. Tallar el cabell — to cut hair: the same word. La talla — the size, also from here. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
Can I hear how this sounds?
Yes, right on this page: click the word and it will play. The sound works on any phone, and nothing needs to be installed.