Today our topic of discussion is – Bengali Loanwords Dutch
Bengali Loanwords Dutch
The historical background
After Portuguese, the next to arrive in Indian sub-continent were the Dutch, with their main base in Ceylon. The Dutch established their colonial rule in South-East Asia which the Portuguese failed to compete with them. In the early 17th century,
the Dutch and English trading companies gradually replaced the overextended Portuguese as the European merchants in Bengal’s port cities. Granted permission by Shah Jahan in 1635 to trade in Bengal, Dutch established their trading station at Hooghly.
In the vocabulary of Bengali language, very few numbers of Dutch words entered. Such as, /ifkapon/, /iskrup/. /turup/, /ruiton/, /harjan/ etc.
Linguistic analysis of Dutch loanwords
Phonological analysis
There are two processes which are accountable for the sound change of Dutch loanwords. These are-
1. Initial vowel insertion.
2. Substitution
Initial vowel insertion: We get this process of sound change in the following examples, where a vowel is inserted initially-
Substitution: In this process the fricative sound /f/ of Dutch turns into the plosive sound
/p/ of Bengali. Such as-
Morphological analysis
Morphological nature: From the perspective of nature and characteristics, Bengali language received the Dutch words in the form of noun. If we go through the Dutch elements which came in Bengali vocabulary, we will find those all are noun. For
example-
Semantic analysis
The meaning of Dutch loanwords in Bengali vocabulary retained intact while borrowing in all cases. For example –
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