Introducing English Linguistics

Typological classifications based on syntax
At the level of syntax, languages can be typologically classified along
many dimensions. One common way they are classified is to group them
according to the dominant (i.e. most common) word orders that they
exhibit.
Table 2.3 lists the six possible word orders that can potentially occur in
human language, and the frequency with which they occurred in 402 lan-
guages that Tomlin (1986) studied.
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INTRODUCING ENGLISH LINGUISTICS
Table 2.3. Word order types and frequencies
Word order
Frequency
Example languages
SOV
180 languages 
Bengali, Gothic, Hindi, Japanese, 
(44.78%)
Kurdish, Latin, Persian, Turkish
SVO
168 (41.79%)
Arabic (colloquial), English, French,
Malay, Mandarin, Portuguese, Russian,
Spanish, Vietnamese
VSO
37 (9.20%)
Arabic (literary), Aramaic, Hebrew, Irish
VOS
12 (2.99%)
Aneityan, Baure
OVS
5 (1.24%)
Apalai, Arecua, Hixkaryana
OSV
0