In Bulgaria, shaking your head means yes

You ask a waiter in Sofia whether you can still order the dish of the day. He turns his head from side to side with a half smile, and you start looking at the menu again. No need: he said yes. In Bulgaria, turning the head side to side means yes, and moving it up and down means no.

The US government’s commercial service flags this in its guide for business travelers to the country. It also gives the advice that solves every case: when in doubt, ask for a spoken answer.

A misunderstanding 150 years old

The confusion isn’t new. The linguist Roman Jakobson, in a 1972 study of yes and no gestures, recounts how Russian soldiers who served in Bulgaria during the war with Turkey in 1877 and 1878 never forgot the clash between their head gestures and those of the Bulgarians. The reversed signals, he wrote, threw conversations off track and occasionally led to annoying misunderstandings.

The system most English speakers know, nodding down for yes, is shared by the vast majority of European peoples, including Germanic peoples, the French, most Romance-speaking peoples, and East and West Slavs such as Russians, Poles and Czechs. Jakobson notes it’s widespread around the world, but not universal. The Bulgarian system has parallels among a few groups in the Balkans and the Near East.

More than a swapped gesture

Jakobson showed that the Bulgarian “no” isn’t quite our nod for yes. Our yes starts with the head moving forward and down, like a bow, and coming back. The Bulgarian no starts with the head thrown back, away from the other person, before returning to its normal position. When the gesture is repeated several times, the difference blurs, and to an outsider the two look almost identical.

That, according to Jakobson, is why our system needed a “no” that looked nothing like its “yes.” The natural opposite of a bow would be throwing the head back, but repeated over and over, that motion would blur into the nod itself. The solution was to turn the face sideways, away from the other person, a gesture of refusal that breaks face-to-face contact.

The Bulgarian “yes,” turning the head from side to side, has its own logic too, according to Jakobson. By turning the head, usually starting to the right, the speaker offers an ear to the other person, a sign of attention and goodwill toward what’s being said.

Rocking the head like a pendulum, tilting it from one side to the other, is something else: for Jakobson, it signals amazement, somewhere between yes and no.

Head up: the Greek and Turkish no

Bulgaria isn’t the only place in the region where a nod can mislead visitors. In Greece and Turkey, the common gesture for “no” is tilting the head up, an upward nod. According to the linguist Brian Joseph, in a 2000 study quoted by Language Log, the same gesture is found in Arabic-speaking communities and parts of Africa.

Its roots may be ancient. Joseph cites a 1979 survey of European gestures by the zoologist Desmond Morris and colleagues, which suggests the upward nod continues an Ancient Greek gesture. In Europe it’s found in Greece, Turkey and the parts of southern Italy that were once Greek colonies, the old Magna Graecia. Within Italy, the line between the Greek-style gesture and the Western European one reportedly matches the ancient border between Greek Campania and Etruscan territory.

The lesson for travelers is simple: in the Balkans and the eastern Mediterranean, a head movement that looks like “yes” may mean “no.”

What about the Ottoman legend?

There’s a more romantic explanation that gets told in Bulgaria. The country spent five centuries under Ottoman rule, and the legend goes that when the rulers tried to force Bulgarians to convert from Christianity to Islam, they began swapping their gestures: they nodded as if to accept, while inside they were saying no.

It’s a nice story, but it’s a legend, with no record to back it up. Jakobson looked for the explanation in the shape of the movements themselves.

Avoiding the mix-up in real life

The bigger risk isn’t misreading a Bulgarian. It’s being misread yourself. If a shop assistant asks whether you want a bag and you nod the way you would at home, they may take it as “no.” It gets worse when both sides try to adapt at once: the Bulgarian, used to tourists, switches to the Western gesture, while the tourist, who has read about the custom, switches to the Bulgarian one.

That’s why the US guide’s advice is the safest: when in doubt, say it. The two most useful words are short. “Da” means yes, and “ne” means no.

If you’re visiting

• Don’t rely on the gesture alone. If you’re not sure what a head movement meant, ask for the answer out loud.
• Learn the two words in Bulgarian: “da” means yes and “ne” means no.
• In big cities, expect both systems. With English more widely spoken, many Bulgarians use Western-style gestures.
• Watch your own head, too. Your nod for yes may read as no, and the other way round.
• In Greece and Turkey, watch for the upward nod. It usually means no.

FAQ

How do you say yes with your head in Bulgaria?

By turning your head from side to side. The up-and-down nod, which means yes in most of Europe, means no in Bulgaria.

Why do Bulgarians use the gestures the other way round?

The linguist Roman Jakobson explained the difference through the shape of the movements: the Bulgarian no starts by throwing the head back, and the turning yes is a way of offering your ear to the speaker. The story that the custom began as resistance to the Ottomans is a legend.

Do all Bulgarians use the reversed gestures?

Not necessarily. Many, especially in cities and among people used to foreigners, use the Western gesture. That’s why the advice is to ask for a spoken answer.

Where else do head gestures differ?

In Greece and Turkey, tilting the head up is the usual gesture for no. It’s also found in Arabic-speaking communities and parts of Africa.

Gestures feel universal until your first trip. In Switzerland, the mix-up is a different one: the rule everyone repeats about not flushing the toilet at night was never actually a law.

Sources

• Bulgaria – Business Travel, International Trade Administration, US government: the yes and no gestures and the advice to ask for a spoken answer.
• Nods, Language Log, University of Pennsylvania, 2018: excerpts from Roman Jakobson’s “Motor signs for ‘Yes’ and ‘No’” (Language in Society, 1972) on the Russian soldiers of 1877–78, head-gesture systems in Europe and the shape of the Bulgarian yes and no, plus Brian Joseph (2000) on the upward nod in Greece, Turkey and southern Italy.
• Why Do Bulgarians Shake Their Heads To Say Yes?, Culture Trip, 2017: the Ottoman legend.