Do most linguists actually know a lot of languages?

Or do they just simply study the relationships between them, but don't actually learn to speak them anywhere near a native level? Just curious, as many people I've met assume that they're master polyglots, but I don't know if that's necessarily the case.

A good one should know about 10.

Although one can pass with 5-6, and a familiarity with as many.

Depends on the type of linguist... Depending on their particular subfield, some may end up teaching themselves (or studying) 10 languages, or they have learned 2-3 in the course of their studies, or they might well only know their native language.

They probably know the names of some languages...

... and to which family you can classify them. And which dialects there are for each language group. True linguists are the ones who study languages of tribal peoples by intense contact or who decipher ancient texts.

Baldewin, you always spoil it with the shit that comes out of your mouth..!! piss off please..!!

You just didn't get your Bachelor degee in Linguistics, isn't it?

I'm interested in linguistics. But I can only speak one other language besides English well enough to really have a conversation in it. Someone introduced me as the "guy that can speak 5 languages fluently, and lots of other people have said similar things--and refuse to believe that I'm not a hyperpolyglot. It's probably because I love talking about languages, and can read in several languages with what sounds like a perfect (native-sounding) accent to English speakers.

And many people that can speak a huge number of languages often speak very closely related languages: such as someone that spoke, say Spanish, Catalan, Portuguese; Norwegian, Swedish, Danish; Serbian and Croatian--8 languages total!