Empires Of The Word - Part 40
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Part 40

23. Discourse delivered at a Meeting of the Society of Arts and Sciences in Batavia, on 24th day of April 1813 ...Verhandelingen van het [Koninklijk] Bataviaasch Genootschap van Kunsten en Wetenschappen, 7, Batavia, 1814, p. 13. Quoted in Hoffman (1979: 73).

24. Hoffman (1979: 74-5).

25. Bijblad op het Staatsblad van Nederlandsch-Indie, 1904, no. 5821, pp. 78-9; Charles Adriaan van Ophuijsen, Maleische Spraakkunst, Leiden, 1910. The context is described in Hoffman (1979: 87-92). It was reformed in 1947 and 1972, ironing out most differences with the spelling used in Malaysia.

26. Jean, in his translation of Boethius. He was in fact a native of Meun-sur-Loire, near Orleans.

27. Ordonnance de Villers-Cotterets, Art. 111: 'Et pour ce que telles choses sont souventes fois advenues sur l'intelligence des mots latins contenuz esd. arrestz, nous voulons que doresnavant tout arrestz, ensemble toutes autres procedures, soient de noz courtz souveraines ou autres subalternes et inferieurs, soient des registres, enquestes, contractz, commissions, sentences, testamens et autres qielzconques actes et exploictz de justice ou qui en deppenden, soient p.r.o.noncez, enregistrez et delivrez aux parties en langage maternel froncois et non autrement.'

28. Picoche and March.e.l.lo-Nizia (1989: 29).

29. Chaucer, Canterbury Tales, Prologue, 11. 124-6.

30. Quoted in Picoche and March.e.l.lo-Nizia (1989: 143).

31. Descartes, Discours de la methode, troisieme partie: 'suivant les opinions les plus moderees et les plus eloignees de l'exces qui fussent communement recues en pratique par les mieux senses de ceux avec lesquels j'aurais a vivre...tscher toujours plutot a me vaincre que la fortune, et changer mes desirs que l'ordre du monde ...'

32. ibid., quatrieme partie: 'je jugeai que je pouvais prendre pour regle generale que les choses que nous concevons fort clairement et fort distinctement sont toutes vraies ...'

33. Picoche and March.e.l.lo-Nizia (1989: 154).

34. ibid.: 150.

35. Leclerc (2001: La Nouvelle-France (1534-1760), pp. 2,4) gives an estimate of about 2500 French in 1663, as against 80,000 English and 10,000 Dutch even in 1627. In 1754, his figures are 69,000 French (55,000 in Nouvelle-France, 10,000 in Acadie, and 4000 in Louisiane) against 1 million English colonists with their 300,000 slaves.

36. 'Colbert qui revait de voir ces indigenes et ces Francais de la Nouvelle-France ne former qu'un mesme peuple et un mesme sang, se plaint a Talon en 1666 qu'on n'ait pas oblige les sauvages a s'instruire dans notre langue, au lieu que pour avoir quelque commerce avec eux nos francais ont ete necessites d'apprendre la leur' Dorion and Morissonneau (1992).

37. He was Le Sieur de Bacqueville et de La Potherie, and he actually wrote: 'On y parle ici parfaitement bien sans mauvais accent. Quoiqu'il y ait un melange de presque toutes les provinces de France, on ne saurait distinguer le parler d'aucune dans les canadiennes' (Leclerc 2001: La Nouvelle-France (1534-1760), pp. 4, 5).

38. 'Les paysans canadiens parlent tres bien le francais' (Leclerc 2001: La Nouvelle-France (1534-1760), p. 9).

39. Barraclough (1978: 208).

40. Picoche and March.e.l.lo-Nizia (1989: 64).

41. Grimes (2000). The figure for Pondicherry comes from Leclerc (2001, Les etats ou le francais est langue officielle ou coofficielle, ).42. Unfortunately for them, the Muslim majority was also growing at a comparable rate, from 2 to 8.7 million in the same period (Picoche and March.e.l.lo-Nizia 1989: 86, 104).43. F. M. Dostoyevsky, Collected Works, vol. 21, in Writers Diary for 1880-81, iii, pp. 517-18. The Cyrillic spelling has not been modernised. These words were written in reaction to a celebrated Russian victory over the Turkmens at Gok Tepe ('Blue Hill'), on which Lord Curzon also commented: 'The terrifying effect of such a ma.s.sacre as Geok Tepe survives for generations' (Russia in Central Asia in 1889 and the Anglo-Russian Question, London: Frank Ca.s.s, 1967, p. 386).44. Hosking (1997: 5-6).45. ibid.: 379.46. ibid.: 369.47. Lieven (2000: 334).48. Hosking (1997: 18): Gen. Rostislav Fadeyev, 60 Tbilisi 1860, p. 9.49. These figures are calculated from those in Grimes (2000). Evidently, Russian is very widely known and used as a second language in these countries (e.g. Grimes quotes 30 per cent for Armenia).50. Roy (2000: 30-31).51. ibid.: 32.52. This figure is calculated from those in Grimes (2000).53. This figure is calculated from those in ibid.54. Archpriest Avvak.u.m, quoted in Hosking (1997:69).55. Lieven (2000: 255, 435, 278 and 437); he relies strongly on Gudrun Persson's 1999 London University PhD thesis: The Russian Army and Foreign Wars 1859-1871.56. Hosking (1997: 187).57. ibid.: 36, quoting Erik Amburger, Geschichte der Behordenorganisation Russlands von Peter dem Grossen bis 1917, 1966, pp. 502-19, and Walter Laqueur, Russia and Germany, 1965, pp. 40-1.58. Hosking (1997: 309-10).59. ibid.: 402; Comrie (1981: 28).60. Hosking (1997: 311), quoting Jeffrey Brooks, When Russia learnt to read: literary and popular culture, 1985.61. Fisher (1978: 100-4).62. Comrie (1981: 28).63. ibid.: 1.64. M. I. Isayev, National Languages in the USSR: Problems and solutions, 1977, pp. 300-1, quoted in Comrie (1981: 36-7).65. Roy (2000: 169).66. Barraclough (1978: 140).67. Tsurumi (1984:277).68. Chen (1984: 242), quoting Ken'ichi Kondo (ed.), Taiheiyo senka no Chosen oyobi Taiwan, 'Korea and Taiwan during the Pacific War', Tokyo, 1961.69. Tsurumi (1984: 303), paraphrasing Aoyagi Tsunataro Keijo (Seoul), Shin Chosen, 'New Korea', 1925.70. See Miyawaki (2002): he notes a married couple in Micronesia, still using j.a.panese as a convenient means of communication that their children will not understand.12 Microcosm or Distorting Mirror? The Career of English 1. T. S. Eliot, Four Quartets (1942), 'Little Gidding', part 2.2. Brandt (1969: 374).3. Smith (2000: 164).4. Crowley (2000: 15). The original Norman French reads: 'III. Item ordine est et establie que chescun Engleys use la lang Engleis et soit nome par nom Engleys enterlessant oulterment la manere de nomere use par Irroies et que chescun Engleys use la manere guise monture et appareill Engleys solonc son estat et si nul Engleys ou Irroies [conversant entre Engleys use la lang Irroies] entre euxmesmes encontre cest ordinance et de ceo soit atteint soint sez terrez et tentz sil eit seisiz en les maines son Seinours immediate tanque qil veigne a un des places nostre Seignour le Roy et trove sufficient seurtee de prendre et user la lang Engleis...et auxiant que les beneficers de seint Esglise conversantz entre Anglois use la langue Engleis et sils ne facent eint leur ordinaries les issues de leur benefices tanque ils usent la langue Angloise en le maniere susdit et eient respit de la langue Engloise apprendre et de celles purvier entre cy et le feste seint Michael prochin avent.'5. Act of Union 1536, section xvii, as quoted in Evans (1992: 298).6. S.P.Hen. VIII to the Town of Galway, 1536, as quoted in Evans (1992: 296).7. Crowley (2000: 19).8. Proclamation of Henry III, 18 October 1258; Patent Rolls, 42 Henry III m. 1, n. 1, Public Record Office, London; as reproduced in Mosse (1962: 234).9. Trevisa re. Polychronicon Ranulphi Higden, i, 59. The text is given in the (London) form published by William Caxton in 1482, since this is substantially easier to read than Trevisa's own Cornish dialect. The punctuation and capitalisation are also adjusted for ease of modern reading. The relevant words of Higden are: 'Haec quidem nativae linguae corruptio provenit hodie multum ex duobus; quod videlicet pueri in scholis contra morem caeterarum nationum a primo Normannorum adventu, derelicto proprio vulgari construere Gallice compelluntur; item quod filii n.o.bilium ab ipsis cunabulorum crepundiis ad Gallic.u.m idioma informantur. Quibus profecto rurales homines a.s.similari volentes, ut per hoc spectabiliores videantur, francigenare satagunt omni nisu.'10. Cursor Mundi, a.s.sumption of Our Lady, II.51-4.11. Chaucer, Troilus and Criseide, v, **II. 1793-9.12. From William Caxton, Prologue to Eneydos, 1490.13. The most celebrated was Johann Clajus, Grammatica Germanicae linguae...ex Bibliis Lutheri Germanicis et aliis ejus libris collecta, Leipzig, 1578. These last two paragraphs are heavily dependent on Febvre and Martin (1958: 481-91).14. They are listed in Nicolson (2003: 247-50), along with many of their Continental contemporaries, starting with the first printed Bible in Czech in 1488.15. By the 1620s, all the gentry could read. By the 1640s, so could 45 per cent of the yeomanry, and perhaps 5 per cent of labourers. Literacy was higher among men than women, and in London than in the provinces (Nicolson 2003: 122).16. Sir John Seeley, The Expansion of England, Lecture I.17. Keynes (1930: 156-7).18. Ferguson (2003: 11).19. ibid.: 13.20. Williams (1643: chs i, vi, viii). The full t.i.tle is: 'A Key into the Language of America, or An help to the Language of the Natives in that part of America called New England. Together with brief Observations of the Customes, Manners and Worships, &c of the aforesaid Natives, in Peace and Warre, in Life and Death. On all of which are added Spirituall Observations, Generall and Particular, of the Authour, of chiefe and speciall use (upon all occasions,) to all the English Inhabiting those parts; yet pleasant and profitable to the view of all men.' The author was expelled from Ma.s.sachusetts for his liberal opinions, but went on to found Providence, Rhode Island.21. Williams (1643: chs iii and xvii).22. Examples derived from Silver and Miller (1997: 319). Pen.o.bscot, referred to there, is a variety of Abenaki.23. Eliot (1666). Although a formal grammar, it does not pa.s.s up the odd opportunity for improving comments, e.g. p. 7: 'And hence is that wise Saying, That a Christian must be adorned with as many Adverbs as Adjectives: He must as well do good, as be good. When a man's virtuous Actions are well adorned with Adverbs, every one will conclude that the man is well adorned with virtuous Adjectives.'24. Eliot (1663): this has the distinction of being the first translation of the Bible in the Americas, although the Spanish, with their Catholic approach to Christianity, had been publishing prayers and confessionals in American languages since 1539. See Chapter 10, 'First c.h.i.n.ks in the language barrier: Interpreters, bilinguals, grammarians', p. 341.25. Cotton Mather (1663-1728), quoted in (indirectly) Bailey (1992: 73).26. Barraclough (1978: 221).27. The border with Mexico was finalised a little later, by the Gadsden Purchase of 1853, which added a southern sliver to the modern states of Arizona and New Mexico to field a new route for the Southern Pacific Railroad.28. Quoted in Milner et al. (1994:168). The acquisition of the west was immediately cemented by the discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill in northern California in January 1848, and the world's most famous gold rush. The resulting jump in population accelerated California's acquisition of statehood to a period of two years, a new record.29. Quoted in ibid.: 146.30. Quoted in Sharon Gangitano, Indian Language ().31. US Census Bureau, quoted in Wright (2000: 266).32. US Census Bureau 1989, 1994, quoted in Crawford (1998).33. Slate (2001: 391).34. Memorandum of M. Austin's Journey, 1796-1797, Amer. Hist. Rev., v, pp. 518-42.35. Welling (2001).36. US Census Bureau, quoted in Wright (2000:490); state populations likewise, pp. 169-201.37.Gholam Hossein Khan (1902 [1789]: iii, 191-2).38. Thomas Babington Macaulay, Minute of 2 February 1835 on Indian Education, 1835 (reprinted in Young 1957: 721-4). Although this a particularly pernicious example of cultural chauvinism on behalf of English, and played a major role in the withdrawal of support for Sanskrit education in India, Macaulay was thinking not of English's own culture exclusively but rather of his belief that English could provide access (where necessary, through texts already translated) to every aspect of world culture. But his easy a.s.surance that Indians could afford to neglect their own traditions is a monument to the kind of cultural overconfidence bred by successful imperialism.39. J. J. Campos, The History of the Portuguese in Bengal, 1919, p. 173, cited in Sinha (1978:3).40. Holden Furber, Bombay Presidency in the Mid-Eighteenth Century, 1965, p. 2, cited in Sinha (1978: 6).41. Polier (2001). Characteristically, the work is called I'jaz-i Arsalani, the 'wonderment of Arsalan', alluding to the author's own Persianate t.i.tle, Arsalan-i-Jang, 'lion of battle', bestowed by the Mughal emperor Shah Alam himself (p. 9). In their Introduction, p. 70, the modern translators point out Polier's cla.s.sic approach to a dispute between his two Indian wives, threatening one mother-in-law while appealing to her sense of shame for her daughter. Polier went on to marry a third wife after his return to France in 1788.42. S. N. Mukherjee, History of Education in India, 1961, p. 30, cited in Sinha (1978: 27).43. Ingram (1969: 235-6).44. Sinha (1978: 28).45. 'All Ministers shall be obliged to learn within one year after their arrival the Portuguese language and shall apply themselves to learn the native language of the country where they shall reside, the better to enable them to instruct the Gentoos that shall be the servants or the slaves of the company, or of their agents, in the Protestant Religion' (J. W. Kaye, The Administration of the East India Company, 1853, p. 626, cited in Sinha (1978: 10).46. Sinha (1978: 13); Kachru (1983: 21).47. W. H. Carey, The Good Old Days of Honourable John Company, 1906, p. 397, cited in Sinha (1978: 10).