By C. Staniland Wake
The existence of a connection between the language of the Malagasy and that of the Malays is so evident that all matters relating to the latter people are of importance, as bearing on the question of the origin of the natives of Madagascar.
The Malays would seem to be first mentioned in the Chinese annals, which refer to the existence, between the years 618 and 939 of our era, of eighteen small States, probably Shan, in Further India, north of the country of the Malays. The Shans, to whom the Siamese are closely allied, were therefore preceded in that region by not only the Burmese, who are probably related to the Naga tribes, but also the allied Cliams and Malays, whose affinities would be rather with the Mongolian peoples of India, now represented by the Kolarian tribes. This view is evidently supported by the statement of M. Vivien de Saint-Martin that there is a general and primitive relationship between the "innumerable ramifications of the non-Aryan race of India and Indo-China." The Rev. Dr. Mason and other writers have found a similarity between the language of the Môn of Tegu and that of the Mundakols of Chutia Nagpur, and Dr. Latham states that the Malay language is connected with the Môn, and therefore also with the Kolarian dialects of India. He associates with them, as belonging to the same group, the language of Cambodia. Mr. Cust agrees in allowing a relationship between Môn and Cambodian, but he classes the Malay language as a distinct family. Prof. A. H. Keane affirms, on the other hand, that the Khmer of Cambodia has nothing in common with the Kolarian except a few verbal resemblances through the Talaing, and that the Malay is "unmixed in structure and fundamentally related to the Cambodian." If we test these statements by reference to the numerals of those languages, we find that the Khmer differs from Malay and agrees with the Kolarian dialects. This is shown by the following table:
The Malay numeral ampat, four, is probably derived from the Kolarian, but some of the others are evidently of Dravidian origin. This is true doubtless of satu, one, which appears to be connected with Brahui asit, one, in Dravidian or-u, the r and s being interchangeable. The Malay numerals dalapan, eight, sambilan, nine, and sapula, ten, are certainly connected with the Dravidian. Dr. Caldwell remarks[1] that the classical Tamil grammars teach that pattu, ten, may in certain connections be written pahdu, from pag-u, to divide, which corresponds to pagudi, classical Tamil pâl, a division. Thus the ancient Tamil orupukadu is oru pahdu, one ten. We have here the explanation of the Malay sapula, which likewise means "one ten," the word pula being evidently connected with the Dravidian numeral. The Malay word sambilan, nine, has a similar explanation. Dr. Caldwell explains the Tamil onbadu, nine, in Malayalam ombadu, as compounded of the ordinary Dravidian or, one, and padu, ten, and as having the meaning of "one from ten." The Malay sambilan has the same sense, and is compounded of sa(m), one, and pula (bilan), ten. Dr. Caldwell applies to the Dravidian numerals the rule "characteristic of the Scythian languages," that they "use for eight and nine compounds which signify ten minus two and ten minus one." This rule applies, as we have seen, to the Malay numeral nine, and it does so also to eight. Thus dalapan is compounded of dua, two, and pula, ten; as in Telugu enimidi, ten, meaning "two from ten," is formed of eni, two, and midi, which is really identical with padi, ten.
Prof. Keane refers to the Indo-Pacific numerals as common elements in the Malay and Polynesian languages; he points out that in the Samoan sefalu, ten, we have a reduplication of the "enunciative particle," "the expression being really equivalent to sa-sa-falu, ‘a one-ten.‘" He says further that "the needless repetition shows that the original sense has long been lost: a further proof of the vast antiquity and independence of the Sawaiori [Polynesian] tongues." Prof. Keane adds that as the "common elements in the Indo-Pacific languages are organic and not borrowed," these languages "form a linguistic family in the same sense that the Aryan or Semitic are linguistic families." The evident connection between the Malay and the Dravidian numerals throws doubt, however, on that conclusion. Prof. Keane refers also to the Polynesian word for five, lima, which he supposes to have originally meant hand, as it still usually does, and he states that "this meaning is lost in Malay, Javanese, Malagasy, etc., where lima, retained as a numeral, has been replaced in the sense of hand by tanglan, tahan, etc." So far, however, from the Malay having exchanged lima for tanghan, the probability is that it never used the former word in the sense of "hand;" as tanghan or an allied form is thus used by the Asiatic peoples to whom the Malays are most closely related. This view is not inconsistent with the remarks on the numeral "five" in the Dravidian languages made by Dr. Caldwell, who suggests that it might be derived from kei, in Tamil a hand. Probably the Dravidian word for hand, in Gond kaik, as well as the numeral five, saighan in Gond, and the Malay tanghan are derived from a common root meaning "hand." It is noticeable that in Samoan the word lima is not used in speaking of a chief‘s hand. This is ‘a ‘ao, in other Polynesian dialects kakao, which is the original form, and is evidently allied to the words just referred to. The origin of the word lima is probably to be sought in the languages of Cochin Chlina, in which the numeral five is naru or laru, unless it is derived from the Shan dialects, which have the word mu or mi for "hand." The Malay would seem to have taken its numerals "two" and "three " from the same source as that to which it was indebted for the word tanghan. In the Tungus languages "five" is tonga, or a slightly differing form of this word, and in the same languages we have dzur, dzhoua, dyul, dyur for "two," and ela, gilang, ilan for "three," answering to the Malay dua and tiga, which in Polynesian become lua and tolu.
The consideration of the numeral systems of the Malay and Cambodian does not support the conclusion that these languages are of the same family. Prof. Keane refers, however, to a feature possessed by both of them, which he considers so peculiarly distinctive as of itself alone almost to be sufficient to establish their common origin. This is the use of identical infixes.[2] It should be noted, however, that this important feature is not met with in the Polynesian dialects, which employ a prefix[3] instead, although it is found in all the true Malayan dialects, and is especially frequent in those of the Philippine islands. Prof. Keane does not give the origin of this "Malayan feature," as it is termed by the Rev. L. Dahle, who first pointed out its presence in Malagasy. It is somewhat difficult to understand how the use of infixes can be universal in Malay, but not be met with in Polynesian, if, as Prof Keane supposes, those languages form one family with the "polysyllabic untoned languages of Indo-China," which the Malays are said to have acquired. If the Polynesian and Cambodian languages belong to the same family, that feature must either have been developed after their separation or have been acquired by the latter from a foreign source. When we consider that the use of infixes is essentially Malayan, we are tempted to believe that it has been taken by the Cambodian from the Malay or an allied language, such as the Chain. The latter opinion is supported by certain other characters of the Khmer tongue. This is classed by Mr.Keane with the "polysyllabic untoned languages," and rightly so inasmuch as the Khmer is pronounced recto-tono; although the same word has several significations, the sense of the phrase alone giving the true signification. According to M. Moura, however, the Cambodian language is really monosyllabic. He says expressly,"like all the languages and idioms spoken in our days by the peoples of the extreme East, the Cambodian is a monosyllabic language."
He adds, "in books of poetry, theology and even sometimes in ordinary language, a certain number of polysyllabic words are found, but these words are generally of Sanskrit or Pali origin, and prove nothing against the general character of the language." M. Moura cites various words which have been derived from the Pali, and which could be indefinitely added to. He states that they have been shortened, so as to reduce them as much as possible to the monosyllabic form," which is one of the distinctive features of the genius of the Khmer language." If this language is in reality monosyllabic, Prof. Keane‘s argument, based on its polysyllabic character, cannot be sustained, but even if M. Moura is wrong, we must conclude that the Khmer has been indebted for certain of its features to the Malay rather than the reverse.
As to the verbal relationship between the Khmer and Malay languages we may judge from the comparative vocabularies contained in M. Moura‘s work. Of the 124 words there given only twenty-four are the same in those languages, of which sixteen are however the same also in Cham, which has thirteen other words common to it and Khmer alone. It appears, therefore, that Cham is more nearly related to Khmer, judging from their vocabularies than is Malay. This agrees with the fact of the early communication between the Khmers and the Cham. Moreover, Malay and Cham agree in thirty-three instances out of the 124, showing a closer relation between these two languages than exists between either of them and Khmer. That all these languages include both Kolarian and Dravidian elements is shown by reference to the short comparative vocabulary appended to this paper. Those elements have, however, been derived from different sources. M. Moura would, indeed, seem to think that the language as well as the written character of the Cambodians is derived from the Sanskrit and Pali, and it has no doubt obtained its foreign element chiefly from the north. The Malay, on the other hand, is fundamentally related to the Kolarian and the allied Mongolian languages, and its Dravidian element has been obtained from the south. This feature occupies a more important position in Malay than Dr. Caldwell appears to allow. When referring to the Dravidian word kapp al, a ship, he says that the Malay word for "ship" is kapâl. He adds, however, that "this has probably been borrowed direct from Tamil, and forms one of a small class of Malay words which have sprung from a Dravidian origin, and which were introduced into the Eastern archipelago, either by means of the Klings (Kalingas), who settled there in primitive times, or by means of the Arab traders, whose first settlers in the East were on the Malabar coast, where the Malayalam, the oldest daughter of the Tamil, is spoken." Reference has already been made to the Dravidian origin of some of the Malay numerals, to which may be added that the affix tu in Malay satu, one, appears to be only the neuter formative du, which, according to Dr. Caldwell, is contained in various shapes in the first three Dravidian numerals. Moreover, the Malay sa, like the Dravidian oru, one, is used as the indefinite article. Other verbal agreements could be mentioned, but I will refer to only one other example. Dr. Caldwell states that tî is the classical Tamil word for "fire," but that the more commonly used word is neruppu, in Telugu nippu. Here we have, no doubt, the origin of the Malay api (in Samoan afi), which in Cham takes the form apui. Dr. Leyden long since pointed out that the language of the Malays contains a great number of Tamil, Malayalam and Telinga words which are not found in Sanskrit or the allied Indian languages, and particularly "a variety that are only to be found in Telinga," the vernacular of the ancient kingdom of Kalinga.[4]
____________________
This paper read before the American Philosophical Society, April 18, 1890.
____________________
The Asiatic Affinities of the Malay Language
Author(s): C. Staniland Wake
Source: Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, Vol. 28, No. 132, (Jan.—Jun., 1890), pp. 81-87
Published by: American Philosophical Society
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/983316
Accessed: 10/05/2008 12:10
[1] Grammar of the Dravidian Languages, p. 248, 1875.
[2] Prof. Keane says that the infix is always the liquid m or n or mn, with or without the vowels a, o with m, or a, i with n.
[3] The Samoan prefix is mo.
[4] Asiat. Researches, Vol. x, p. 171.
