b   

babble

The Philippine forms are borrowed from Spanish, and Tetun bobu from Portuguese. The similarity of these words to other forms in Indonesia is attributed to chance.

badge, medal

The meaning of this form rules out any possibility of a reconstruction. Although it may reflect Spanish chapa ‘sheet of metal; thin board’, both the semantic divergence and its absence in Tagalog, Cebuano, or Ilokano, which were more heavily exposed to Spanish influence than either the Dumagat languages or Maranao, remains puzzling.

badly cooked, of rice

Probably a Paiwan loan in Puyuma

bag, sack

Probably a Tagalog loan distribution.

balance:   scale for weighing, balance

Borrowing from Malay, ultimately from Persian. Dempwolff (1938) marked this as a loan distribution, but provided a reconstruction simply to illustrate the regularity of the sound correspondences. However, as with other loans used for a similar purpose, the sound correspondences are not entirely regular, the final glottal stop in Tagalog being an immediate clue to its loan status.

balance for weighing things:   scale, balance for weighing things

Borrowing from Chinese.

bald

Borrowing from Malay.

bald

Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed *sulaq ‘be bald’, but the limited distribution of this form is better explained as a product of borrowing from Malay.

ball

The Philippine forms are borrowed from Spanish, the Indonesian forms from Portuguese, either directly or through Malay.

bamboo

Borrowed into Malay from an Indian source, and thence transmitted to Cebuano (through Malay-speaking Chinese?) in the restricted context of parlor games.

bamboo:   woven bamboo walling material

Probably a Tagalog loan distribution, as shown by the irregular lack of a final consonant in both Agutaynen (expected **sawalik), and Cebuano (expected **sawáliʔ).

bamboo sp.

Borrowing from Malay. Dempwolff (1938) also cites Javanese tələŋ ‘kind of climber, creeper’, but I do not find this either in Pigeaud (1938) or Horne (1974).

banana sp.

Borrowing into Casiguran Dumagat from a GCPh source.

banana

Borrowing from Malay. Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed Uraustronesisch *pisaŋ ‘banana’.

banana fritter

From Spanish turron ‘nougat sweet’.

banana sp.

Probably a Malay loan.

banana species

Apparently a Tagalog loan in Kapampangan.

band

Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed *se(n)tagi ‘band, ribbon’ based on forms in Javanese, Malay and Ngaju Dayak, but I have been unable to find a Javanese form of this word in either Pigeaud (1938) or Horne (1974). Given its limited geographical distribution this form is probably best treated as a loanword from Malay.

band:   ribbon, band

Borrowing of Spanish listón ‘ribbon’.

bandit, robber, thief

Probably a Tagalog loan distribution.

banner, pennant

Borrowing from Malay. Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed ‘Uraustronesisch’ *tuŋgul ‘project; standard, banner’ (hervorragen, Standarte).

banner, ensign

Borrowed from Javanese into Malay and from Malay into other languages. Dempwolff (1938) gives Tagalog pandi ‘banner, ensign’, but I am unable to find this word in any modern dictionary.

bare (of trees)

Chance, or borrowing from Malay.

barter:   exchange barter

Borrowing from Malay. Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed ‘Uraustronesisch’ *tukar ‘to exchange, barter’ (tauschen).

basin

Borrowing from English.

basin

Borrowing, ultimate from Spanish palangana 'basin'.

basin:   metal basin

Borrowing from Malay.

basis:   foundation, basis

Probably a Malay loan distribution. Dempwolff (1938) proposed Uraustronesisch *lapik ‘foundation, basis' (Unterlage).

basket

Borrowing.

beads

Borrowing from Sanskrit.

beans

Borrowing, ultimately from Dutch.

bear, endure

The history of this word is unclear. A number of forms seem clearly to have been borrowed from Malay, including modern Javanese tahan. However, Old Javanese tahən suggests that this was a native word before the modern era. It is possible that the Old Javanese form was borrowed by Malay, underwent the regular merger of *a and schwa in the ultima, and then was disseminated by Malay speakers into a wider range of languages, including modern Javanese. Dempwolff (1938) posited ‘Uraustronesisch’ *taqan ‘to bear, endure’.

beautiful

Borrowing from Malay.

become:   happen, become

Borrowing from Malay. Other Malay loans that contain j- were also borrowed with y- in Philippine languages, as Malay jati, Cebuano yati ‘teak’, or Malay juta ‘million’, Tagalog yútaɁ, saŋ-yútaɁ ‘one hundred thousand’. Since the Malay word itself in the latter comparison is a borrowing of Sanskrit ayuta ‘ten thousand’, it is possible that the Sanskrit form was borrowed directly into Philippine languages rather than through the medium of Malay, but historical records suggest otherwise. If we side with the historical records, and assume that Sanskrit loans in Philipppine languages were invariably mediated through Malay, we must conclude that this word underwent a first loanword adaptation in which /y/ was replaced by /j/, and then a second loanword adaptation in which this change was reversed. The phonological adaptation of jadi, which appears to be a native Malay word, supports this interpretation.

becoming, fitting, appropriate

Borrowing from Javanese into Malay, and then diffusion through Malay to a wider set of languages. Dempwolff (1938) positied Uraustronesisch *pantas ‘be successful, effective’ (Erfolgreichsein).

bed

Borrowing. Probably a Malayic lexical innovation which diffused to Maranao with the introduction of Islam from Brunei. Murut (Timugon) pa-paŋkaw 'raised sleeping area' may be unrelated (cf. root *-kaw 'high, tall').

bed:   cot, bed

Borrowing of Spanish catre ‘small bed’.

beetle:   coconut beetle, coconut blight

Apparently a loanword from Tagalog into Ilokano, although the word is phonologically irregular in both Tagalog (where *-d- > r), and Cebuano (where *-d- > l).

beg

Borrowing from Malay, ultimately from Arabic.

behavior:   irregular behavior

Borrowing from Malay.

belongings:   goods, belongings, things, possessions

Borrowing from Malay. The term *baraŋ apparently was found in PMP as a marker of indefiniteness. The meaning 'things, goods, possessions' evidently was a late innovation in western Indonesia, which, together with the reduplicated form of the word, was widely disseminated through borrowing from Malay.

belt:   purse, money belt

Borrowing from Chinese.

belt or belt clasp

Borrowing from Malay.

bench

Borrowing from Portuguese, Spanish or both.

bench

Borrowing from Malay, ultimately from Tamil. Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed *kaTil ‘bench’.

bend the head back

Probably a Malay loan distribution. Dempwolff (1938) also included Fijian loŋgat-a ‘draw a bow (bend it backward)’. However, this form contains two phonological irregularities and is best treated as unrelated to the forms from western Indonesia.

beri beri

Borrowing from English.

best part:   essence, best part

Borrowing from Malay. Dempwolff also included Tongan matsi (= masi) ‘essence’, and assigned forms from the three languages to Uraustronesisch *paTi ‘essence’. I am unable to find an equivalent of the Tongan word in Churchward (1959), and even if it could be found, the sound correspondences are irregular, as Dempwolff himself noted.

bet, wager in gambling

From Spanish apostar ‘to bet’.

betel pepper

Dempwolff (1938) posited *siriq ‘pepper, betel pepper’, but this comparison is misguided. Tagalog síli, like the similar word in many other Philippine languages (Ilokano síli ‘hot chili pepper: Capsicum sp.’, Bontok sili ‘chili pepper’, Bikol síli ‘chili pepper, hot pepper’, etc.) is borrowed from Mexican Spanish chile, itself a loanword from Nahuatl. The Javanese form is irregular, and the Ngaju Dayak word may well be a Banjarese loan.

betel case

Borrowing, presumably from Malay.

betel:   plant chewed with betel that invigorates

Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed *gambir ‘refreshing’, but it is now clear that this is a loan distribution due to borrowing from Malay. The Tagalog form, which he cited from Laktaw (1914) does not appear in modern dictionaries.

betel nut

The history of this word is puzzling. A priori it appears to be a straightforward comparison pointing to PAn *pineŋ ‘areca nut’, but since better candidates are available for this meaning a reconstruction is immediately suspect. The gloss of the Pazeh form explicitly indicates it as a loanword from Minnan Chinese, and since the Malay word appears to be native this raises a question about the direction of borrowing. The use of betel is not common to Chinese culture as a whole, but is widespread in the Austronesian world, and for this reason it is likely that Malay pinaŋ was borrowed by Hokkien speakers, and transported to Taiwan. There, for reasons that remain obscure, it replaced the native word for this referent (possibly a reflex of PAn *Sawiki, which is reflected in several divergent Formosan languages).

bewail, lament

bewilder, confuse

From Spanish atarantar ‘confuse, bewilder’.

bier, frame for holding a coffin

Borrowing of Spanish andás ‘hand-barrow, stretcher; bier’.

big, large

Borrowing from Malay.

bind tightly

Probably identical to PWMP *tambej ‘tie up, bind tightly’, but with borrowing of the Malay form tambat into the other languages cited here. Dempwolff (1938) posited ‘Uraustronesisch’ *tambat ‘bind tightly’.

binding:   cane cord used for heavy binding

Probably a loanword from Malay, although the unreducted medial clusters in Batak languages are problematic under this interpretation.

bird

Borrowing from Malay.

bird sp.

Borrowing from Malay.

bird sp.

Dempwolff (1934-38) compared these forms with Javanese siuŋ, ciuŋ 'name of a bird' (not in Pigeaud 1938) and reached a reconstruction *iuŋ 'name of a bird that imitates sounds' by dismissing the discrepancy in the initial consonant of the Javanese form. Entirely apart from this phonological problem the mynah is not native to island Southeast Asia, and it seems best to simply discard the comparison.

bird clapper (to frighten them from fields)

Dempwolff reconstructed *kenTuŋ ‘bird clapper’, but the highly restricted distribution of this form is best explained as a product of borrowing from Malay. I have, moreover, been unable to find the Javanese form he gives in either Pigeaud (1938) or Horne (1974). With root *-tuŋ ‘deep resounding sound’.

Bitter orange Seville orange: Citrus aurantium

From Spanish cajel ‘Bitter orange, Seville orange (also called ‘blood orange’), a native of the Mediterranean region that must have been imported into the Philippines directly from Spain, rather than through the usual Mexican route for plants introduced during the Spanish colonial period.

black dye

From Spanish tinta ‘dye, tint’.

blacksmith

Borrowing, ultimately from Sanskrit.

blame:   accusation, blame

Borrowing, ultimately from Arabic, but with the Bornean and Philippine forms acquired indirectly through the medium of Malay.

blame:   argue, blame

Borrowing from Malay, ultimately from Arabic.

blanket

Borrowing of Spanish manta ‘blanket’.

bleat

Borrowed, or a convergent product of onomatopoeia associated with a borrowed animal. Sheep and goats probably were introduced into the Austronesian world during the Indianization of Southeast Asia. From a point or points of entry in western Indonesia they must have spread northward into the Philippines and eastward into the Lesser Sundas. Fox, J. (1977:43) notes that on Roti and Savu in the Lesser Sundas "Goats are considered the 'real' or 'native' animal ... and sheep have been assimilated to this category." This may indicate different times of introduction into island Southeast Asia for the two animals, or different rates of diffusion from a common place and time of initial introduction.

blessing

Borrowing, ultimately from Arabic.

blight:   coconut beetle, coconut blight

Apparently a loanword from Tagalog into Ilokano, although the word is phonologically irregular in both Tagalog (where *-d- > r), and Cebuano (where *-d- > l).

blossom

Dempwolff (1938) proposed *kambaŋ ‘to blossom’ (dbl. *kembaŋ, *kembuŋ), but his comparison appears to conflate disparate elements. The Tagalog form can be more convincingly compared with Malay kəmbaŋ ‘expansion; blossoming out; (Java) flower’, Old Javanese kəmbaŋ, kambaŋ ‘flower’, məmbaŋ ‘to open, of a flower’, Javanese kembaŋ ‘flower, blossom’, where it seems clearly to be a loanword. Ngaju Dayak kambaŋ is almost certainly a Javanese loan.

blue

Borrowing from Malay. Under this interpretation the d of Mongondow mo-bidu presents difficulties, since it would normally be assumed that where variants in d, r appear the d variant is historically primary. However, neither Iban biru nor Malay biru can regularly reflect *bidu, and for the present it is perhaps best to assume that Mongondow mo-bidu is a result of analogical back-formation from a loanword with r. For instances of hypercorrection involving r and y in the history of Mongondow see Blust (1982).

blunt dull

Borrowing from Malay. Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed ‘Uraustronesisch’ *tampak ‘to blunt, make something dull’ (abstumpfen).

boat

Borrowing from Javanese, with nasalization of a semivowel following a nasal in Ngaju Dayak (cf. Dempwolff 1922). The comparison of the Old Javanese and Makassarese forms was first made by Dempwolff (1920:48, #201).

boat

Borrowing from Malay.

boat

Borrowing from a GCPh language in which *-d- had already become -r-.

boat

Borrowing. Although Makassarese bintaʔ may be borrowed from Malay, the association of this term with piracy makes it likely that all of the words cited here derive ultimately from Sama Bajau.

boat:   Chinese boat

body

Borrowing from Arabic through Malay.

bolo, machete

Probably a Tagalog loan. Any word which implies metallurgy (as opposed to simple knowledge of iron ore) is almost certainly post-Proto-Philippines.

bolo:   sword, kris, bolo

Since this reconstruction implies the use of metallurgy, the comparison almost certainly is a product of borrowing from Malay. It is noteworthy, however, that in areas that developed metallurgy relatively early, as Borneo, this word does not appear, suggesting that it skipped areas in which native smiths were already producing iron tools, and spread from Malay into the Philippines prior to the advent of metallurgy in that archipelago.

bolt lock

Also Toba Batak hinsu (< met.) ‘closed, locked’. Borrowing from Malay. Dempwolff (1938) posited *kunci ‘lock (plug)’.

bomb

boom of a sail:   prop, support, boom of a sail

The mid-back vowel in Javanese, Balinese and Sasak, and the meaning in languages of Mindanao suggest strongly that this comparison is a product of borrowing from Malay.

bore through

Apart from Iban the western Indonesian forms are likely Malay loans, and the resemblance of the Fijian form to the others cited here is best attributed to chance.

born:   Chinese born in Indonesia

Borrowing from Malay.

boss:   master, boss

From Spanish amo ‘master of the house; master, employer; proprietor; foreman’.

bottle:   four-cornered bottle

boundary marker

Borrowing of Spanish mojón ‘landmark; signpost; milestone’.

box

Borrowing from Malay. Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed ‘Uraustronesisch’ *tinzu ‘to box’ (boxen).

box, fight with fists

Borrowed from Spanish puñeta ‘a blow with the fist’.

box chest

Borrowing from Malay, but ultimately from Tamil. Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed Uraustronesisch *peTi ‘box, chest’.

brain

Dempwolff (1934-38) reconstructed *utak (doublet *utek) 'brain', but Malay otak, utak can reflect either form. Tagalog útak is probably best regarded as a Kapampangan loan and Javanese utak as a borrowing from Malay.

breadfruit

This etymology is very odd. Neither Tagalog nor Cebuano has r- in native forms, yet both have it in this word, and if it is a loan the source is unclear. Moreover, rímas is in competition with *kamansi(q), *kulu, and *qatipulu, all of which refer to types of breadfruit in Philippine languages. One possibility is that there were names for several types of both seeded and seedless breadfruit, and that one of these was *rímas, which was borrowed into Tagalog and Cebuano after *r had already become /l/ in those languages. The Aklanon form looks like a hypercorrection, but this would only be possible for speakers who realized that most Spanish names of introduced plants were borrowed in their plural forms (as bayabas < Spanish guayaba).

breaking:   sound of breaking

Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed ‘Uraustronesisch’ *tas ‘sound of breaking or tearing’. Possibly native, but the limited geographical distribution of this onomatopoetic form makes it difficult to confidently attribute it to a language with much time-depth.

bribe

Apparently a Tagalog loan in languages outside the Central Philippine group.

bridge

Presumably a loan, although the direction of borrowing is unclear. Given traditional technologies this almost certainly refers in all cases to a suspension bridge, or did so until modern times.

bright

A chance resemblance. Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed ‘Uraustronesisch’ *tara ‘come to light; be bright’.

bright, clear

The western Indonesian forms appear to be borrowed from Malay the Tagalog form probably has no connection with these. Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed ‘Uraustronesisch’ *teraŋ ‘bright’ (hellsein).

broth, gravy

Borrowing from Malay.

brown:   tree with edible hairy brown fruit: Diospyros discolor

Evidently a commercial name in the Philippines reflecting *ma- ‘stative’ + *bulu ‘hairy’. For what is presumably the original name cf, *kamaguŋ.

bucket, pail

Borrowing, ultimately from Portuguese balde in Indonesia. The similar form in Philippine languages probably was borrowed independently from Spanish.

budge, move slowly

Borrowing from Malay.

buffalo:   water buffalo, carabao

Borrowing from Malay, ultimately from a Mon-Khmer source (Thurgood 1999:322). Kavalan has several loanwords from Philippine languages and from Spanish that date to the brief Spanish occupation of the Ilan basin from 1626-1642, during which time they came up from Manila in an attempt to expand their colonial holdings. The source of Fijian karavau remains unclear. Capell (1968:85) entertains two speculations: 1. “the name came from Vuda, where the people, seeing reddish cattle, called them after the cloth karavau”, 2. “probably Eng. caribou”. The second of these appears particularly improbable.

Buginese

Borrowing, either from Malay or from Buginese itself, although the negative characterizations of Buginese temperament in Ngaju Dayak and Kambera must be creations in those languages. This item serves to demonstrate the extent to which the Buginese sailors of southern Sulawesi were known for centuries as a result of their trade and other contacts throughout the coastal areas of much of central and eastern Indonesia.

bulge out

This item appears to be a GCPh innovation which has been borrowed from Tagalog into Kapampangan, Pangasinan and Ilokano. The similarity of these forms to Malagasy vónto, vóntona and Javanese butun which led Dempwolff to include them in a single cognate set is attributed to chance.

bullet

The meaning of this form is clearly borrowed, although the form itself may be native, since to date no loan source has been identified.

bundle of things to be sold

From Spanish atado ‘bundle, parcel’.

buoy

Borrowing from Spanish (Philippine forms) and Portuguese (Malay).

burden on the shoulder

Borrowing from Malay or Javanese. Based on the comparison of Ngaju Dayak, Malay, and Javanese Dempwolff (1938) proposed Uraustronesisch *pikul ‘burden on the shoulder’ (Schulterlast).

burn cuttings in fields

Probably a Malay loan distribution. On the basis of this comparsion Dempwolff (1938) reconstructed Uraustronesisch *pe(rR)un ‘burning off when clearing a field’ (Abbrennen beim Roden eines Feldes).

burst:   flare up, burst into flame

bush:   machete, bush knife

The Philippine forms and many others (Melanau (Mukah), Toba Batak, Rembong, possibly Ngaju Dayak) appear to be loans from Malay. Maranao paraŋ 'hand trowel, weeding tool' is assumed to be a semantically altered loan or a chance resemblance.

butt of a rifle

Borrowed from Spanish culata ‘butt, stock (of rifle, etc.)’.

butterfly

Borrowing from Malay or Javanese.

button

The Philippine forms are borrowed from Spanish botones ‘buttons’, the Indonesian forms from Portuguese.