Erre con erre cigarro, erre con erre barril; rápido ruedan los carros sobre los rieles del ferrocarril.
Meaning: The definitive Spanish rr drill — unrelenting double-r from start to finish.
Language: Spanish
Literally: R with r cigar, r with r barrel; quickly roll the carts over the railway rails.
Category: Fiendish
Origin: The most famous Spanish tongue twister specifically designed to practise the trill.
More tongue twisters — Fiendish
- Parangaricutirimícuaro — Not a sentence but a single word — a legendary 22-letter pronunciation challenge from a r…
- Didon dîna, dit-on, du dos d'un dodu dindon dont le dodu dos dodine. — A 'd' / 'din' / 'dod' avalanche that seems designed to jam the tongue in third gear.
- Hinter Hermann Hannes Haus hängen hundert Hemden raus. — A relentless 'h' aspirate drill — every word opens with the same breathy attack.
- Chi è Ciccio Capece? Ciccio Capece è un capocaccia che caccia con la cacciaballa. — A 'c/ci/ccia' onslaught — Italian's hard and soft c in the same sentence, non-stop.
- O papa papava o papo do pipo; o pipo papava o papo do papa. — A perfectly palindromic 'p' construction that reverses meaning when you swap the nouns.
- Корабли лавировали, лавировали, да не вылавировали. (Korabli lavirovali, lavirovali, da ne vylavirovali.) — One verb, three inflections, pure 'lav/vir' torture — the word grows with every repetitio…
More Spanish tongue twisters
- Pablito clavó un clavito, ¿qué clavito clavó Pablito? — A bouncy drill on the 'cl' cluster.
- Tres tristes tigres tragaban trigo en un trigal. — A relentless run on the 'tr' sound.
- El cielo está enladrillado, ¿quién lo desenladrillará? — A brutal test of the rolled 'r' and 'l'.
- Como poco coco como, poco coco compro. — A bouncy 'co' drill — the word order and meaning flip with each repetition.
- Pepe Pecas pica papas con un pico. ¿Con qué pico pica papas Pepe Pecas? — A bouncy 'p' cluster that accelerates with the question at the end.
- El perro de San Roque no tiene rabo porque Ramón Ramírez se lo ha robado. — A rolled-'r' workout — every word demands the vibrating trill.
From our untranslatable words
- Vergüenza ajena — The squirming embarrassment felt on behalf of another person, who may be entirely untroub…
- Sobremesa — The unhurried conversation that lingers long after a meal, when no one wants to leave the…
- Madrugada — The liminal hours between midnight and sunrise — that strange, quiet time when the night…