A Manual of the Malay language by Sir Maxwell William Edward (free reads .TXT) 📕
Another characteristic list of words might be made, compounded with the monosyllable tang (which in Sakai and Semang means "hand"), and conveying an idea of seizing or holding.
Tang-an the hand. Tang-kap to seize. Tang-kei a stalk. Tang-gong to support. Tang-gal to drop off (having left hold). Tong-kat a walking-stick, &c.
The history of the Malay people is to be discovered in the language itself, for no authentic records of pre-Muhammadan times exist. Just as an insight into the early history of our own nation may be obtained by analysing the component parts of the English tongue, and assigning to each of the languages which have contributed to make it what it is their due proportion of influence, so, by resolving the Malay language into its separate elements, of which native, Sanskrit, and Arabic are the chief, and by examining the words contributed by each, it is possible to follow with some approach to historical
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9. Crawfurd. See also Marsden, Malay Grammar, xxxiii.
10. “The Hindu religion and Sanskrit language were, in all probability, earliest introduced in the western part of Sumatra, the nearest part of the Archipelago to the continent of India. Java, however, became eventually the favourite abode of Hinduism, and its language the chief recipient of Sanskrit. Through the Javanese and Malays Sanskrit appears to have been disseminated over the rest of the Archipelago, and even to the Philippine Islands. This is to be inferred from the greater number of Sanskrit words in Javanese and Malay—especially in the first of these—than in the other cultivated languages, from their existing in greater purity in the Javanese and Malay, and from the errors of these two languages, both as to sense and orthography, having been copied by all the other tongues. An approximation to the proportions of Sanskrit existing in some of the principal languages will show that the amount constantly diminishes as we recede from Java and Sumatra, until all vestiges of it disappear in the dialects of Polynesia. In the ordinary written language of Java the proportion is about 110 in 1000; in Malay, 50; in the Sunda of Java, 40; in the Bugis, the principal language of Celebes, 17; and in the Tagala, one of the principal languages of the Philippines, about one and a half.” —Crawfurd, Malay Grammar, Dissertation xlvii. Sed quære as to the total absence of Sanskrit in the Polynesian dialects. Ellis’ “Polynesian Researches,” i. 116.
11. A selection of words only is given. There are numbers of Sanskrit words in Malay which have no place in these lists.
12. Unless the Sansk. root likh, to write, may be detected in the second syllable.
13. Journal Royal As. Soc., Bengal, vi. 680; xvii. part i. 154 and 232; Idem, part ii. 62, 66.
14. Malay Grammar, Dissertation vi.
15. This is the derivation given in Favre’s Dictionary. Another from soḍha, (borne, undergone) might perhaps be suggested with equal probability.
16. Asiatic Researches, iii. 11, 12.
17. On the Traces of the Hindu Language and Literature extant among the Malays, As. Res. iv. See also, On the Languages and Literature of the Indo-Chinese Nations, Leyden, As. Res. x.
18. The words in this column have been taken from the Malay and French Dictionary of the Abbé Favre. J. signifies Javanese, S. Sundanese, Bat. Battak, Mak. Makassar, Bu. Bugis, D. Dayak, Bis. Bisaya, Tag. Tagala, and Malg. Malagasi.
19. Favre derives abrak from the Arabic.
20. J., S., and Tag. sila; S. silah, to invite; Bat. sila, a gift of welcome.
21. J., S., and D. utara; Bat. otara; Bis. otala, east wind.
22. Crawfurd’s Malay Grammar, Dissertation clxxxiii.
23. J. mergu; J. sato; S. satoa; D. satua; Bat. santuwa, a mouse.
24. Crawfurd has noticed the fact that the names of the domesticated animals are native, one exception being the goose, which, he thinks, may therefore be supposed to have been of foreign introduction (Crawfurd’s Grammar, Dissertation clxxxiii.). It must be remembered, however, that among the Hindus the goose is worshipped at the festivals of Brahma, and that, being thus in a manner sacred, its Sanskrit name would naturally be in use wherever the Hindu religion spread. Brahma is represented as riding on a white haṃsa.
25. Perhaps a more plausible derivation is from the Tamul ari-mâ, a male lion.
26. J. and S. garuda; Mak. guruda.
27. “Commeline had been informed that the Javans give the name of Malati to the Zambak (Jasminum sambac), which in Sanskrit is called Navamalika, and which, according to Rheede, is used by the Hindus in their sacrifices; but they make offerings of most odoriferous flowers, and particularly of the various Jasmins and Zambaks.” —Sir William Jones, As. Res. iv.
28. Ainslie’s Materia Medica, Madras, 1813. Kanana occurs in the names of several flowers, e.g., kanana karavira, Plumieria alba.
29. Perhaps a corruption of nila-gandhi. Ainslie gives the Sanskrit name as jela-nirghoondi.
30. J. nanas; S. kanas; Bat. honas; D. kanas; J. and S. balimbing; Bat. balingbing.
31. Crawfurd, very likely correctly, derives this from the Portuguese baluârte, a bulwark.
32. Journ. Ind. Arch., v. 572.
33. Crawfurd, Malay Grammar, Dissertation ccii.
34. These two words must have been originally used by Malays in the sense which they bear in Sanskrit. “Unto the shoes of my lord’s feet,” or “beneath the dust of your majesty’s feet,” are phrases in which paduka and duli would immediately precede the name or title of the person addressed. Being thus used always in connection with the titles of royal or distinguished persons, the two words have been taken for honorific titles, and are so used by Malays, unaware of the humble origin of what are to them high-sounding words.
35. “The Javanese have peopled the air, the woods and rivers with various classes of spirits, their belief in which probably constituted their sole religion before the arrival of the Bramins.” —Crawfurd’s Grammar, Dissertation cxcix.
36. “The Javanese consider all the Hindu gods of their former belief not as imaginary beings, but as real demons” (Ibid.), just as the early Christians regarded the classic gods, and attributed oracles to diabolical agency.
37. J., S., Mak., D., and Bis. puasa; Bat. puaso.
38. “Agama in Sanskrit is ‘authority for religious doctrine:’ in Malay and Javanese it is religion itself, and is at present applied both to the Mohammedan and the Christian religions.” —Crawfurd, Malay Grammar, Dissertation cxcviii.
39. I have found both these words used separately and distinctly by Pawangs in the state of Perak. Raffles and Logan confused them. Journ. Ind. Arch., i. 309; History of Java, ii. 369. De Backer mentions ong only. L’Archipel. Indien, p. 287
40. Malay Grammar, Introduction.
41. L’Archipel Indien, p. 53.
42. Maleische Spraakkunst, door G. H. Werndly p. xix.
43. The derivation of judi, gaming, from dyuta (game at dice), seems to be preferable to that adopted by M. Favre (following Van der Tuuk), who refers it to yodi, a warrior.
44. Favre, Grammaire de la Langue Malaise, Introduction, viii.
45. Leyden’s Malay Annals, 65.
46. Besides signifying a range of mountains, Malaya has the secondary meaning of “a garden.” If the term was applied originally in reference to the agricultural pursuits of the primitive tribes, it receives additional illustration from the name given to one of the women whom Sang Sapurba meets on Mount Maha-Meru, “Malini,” a gardener’s wife (Sansk.).
47. See Grœneveldt’s Notes on the Malay Archipelago, compiled from Chinese sources. Verhandelingen van het Bataviaasch Genootschap, xxxix.
48. “Sawa, Jawa, Saba, Jaba, Zaba, &c., has evidently in all times been the capital local name in Indonesia. The whole Archipelago was compressed into an island of that name by the Hindus and Romans. Even in the time of Marco Polo we have only a Java Major and a Java Minor. The Bugis apply the name of Jawa, Jawaka (comp. the Polynesian Sawaiki, Ceramese Sawai) to the Moluccas. One of the principal divisions of Battaland in Sumatra is called Tanah Jawa. Ptolemy has both Jaba and Saba.” —Logan, Journ. Ind. Arch., iv. 338.
49. Senna (Cassia senna), as a medicine, enjoys a high reputation in India and all over the East. In Favre’s Malay-French Dictionary daun sena-maki is translated feuilles de séné, no notice being taken of the last word; but Shakespear’s Hindustani Dictionary has sena makk-i, “senna of Mecca.”
50. Burton’s Pilgrimage to Medinah and Meccah, p. 175.
51. De Backer, L’Archipel Indien, li. (Paris, 1874).
52. Journ. As. Soc. Bengal, iii. 545.
53. In certain foreign words the hard k will be found to be denoted by a dot under the letter, thus, ḳ; and the peculiar vowel sound represented in Arabic by the letter ain is denoted by the Greek rough breathing ‘.
The object of this work is to facilitate the acquisition of an elementary knowledge of the Malay language. It is believed also that some of the hints and suggestions which it contains will be of use to those who already have a colloquial knowledge of Malay, especially if this has been acquired from Indian or Chinese settlers in the Straits of Malacca, not from Malays themselves.
The Roman character is used throughout, but a knowledge of the native character can hardly be dispensed with by those who aim at a thorough acquaintance with the language. As it abounds in idiomatic expressions, the study of native compositions is most important, and these are generally to be found only in the Malay character. Little attempt is made at scientific arrangement. In dealing with the various parts of speech, technical terms are as far as possible avoided, and reliance is placed rather on illustrations than abstract rules. The student should divest himself of the expectation that sentences may be formed in Malay on principles of construction which govern composition in European languages. An elementary knowledge of Malay is so easily acquired that a learner soon begins to construct sentences, and the tendency, of course, is to reproduce the phrases of his own language with words of the new one. He may thus succeed in making himself intelligible, but it need hardly be said that he does not speak the language of the natives. Correctness of expression cannot be entirely learnt from grammars. In this manual cautions and hints will be given, and, where possible, absolute rules will be laid down, but these must not be regarded as complete. Instruction derived from books must be supplemented by constant practice in speaking with Malays—not with Malay-speaking Asiatics of other nationalities—before idioms can be mastered. Until some facility in framing sentences according to native idioms has been attained, and it has been perceived how shades of meaning may be conveyed by emphasis, or by the position of a word in the sentence, the European will find it difficult to convey his ideas in Malay, even with a considerable vocabulary of words at his disposal. A Dutch author justly remarks:— “Malay is called a poor language, and so it is, but not so much so as is often imagined, certainly not as far as its vocabulary is concerned. That it is often unable to furnish us with words for abstract ideas is a deficiency which it has in common with all languages of the Indian Archipelago, or rather with all races who have not yet risen to the height of our civilisation and development. Its richness or poverty, however, must not be judged by the existing dictionaries, or by the contents of those manuscripts which are known to us. When Malays are seated together talking about various topics of everyday life, they are not in want of words, and such conversations would, if noted down, provide our present dictionaries with a good many supplements, additions, corrections, and appendices.”1
I. THE ARTICLE.There is no article in Malay, that is, there is no word
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