Afrikaans is a language of mystery. It was born on the South African Cape and means "the language of Africa." But who were itís parents? How did this language which boasts of over five million speakers truly come to be (Gouws et al., 1992)? How did this Indo-European creolized language appear on the tip of the Dark Continent? It is a complicated story filled with struggle. To understand the story and to gain answers to these questions it is necessary to begin at the beginning.

In April of 1652, 180 officials of the Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie or "Dutch East India Company" (hereafter referred to as the "Company") arrived at South Africaís Cape. Their purpose was to establish a "refreshment station" for the Company between Amsterdam and Batavia. Eventually this small settlement grew and multiplied in diversity. Nomadic Khoi, French Huguenots and Dutch colonists lived in close proximity to each other and came in contact regularly (Ponelis, 1993). This propinquity of such a diverse group of people led to problems in the establishment of religion, education and, of course, language.

Since the Company was the final authority in things pertaining to the settlement they chose the religion. Only Calvinism was allowed. This alienated many of the slaves form their preferred faith--Catholicism. Because of this alienation and the fact that little

missionary work was going on--especially to the lower classes--the slaves and the Khoi were pushed even further out of the religious arena which also kept them distanced from education (Ponelis, 1993).

What little education available was also supervised by the Company and carried out by the church. In 1658, the first of the slaves from Madagascar, Angola, Southern India, and the Indonesian archipelago were shipped to the Cape and the Company was convinced that the slaves needed to learn Dutch (Van Deusen-Scholl, 1997; Ponelis, 1993). These "public schools" were open to whites, slaves, and Khoi. The quality of education was shabby, however, and consisted mostly of memorizing prayers, hymns, reading the Bible and writing. The schools were taught by "sick comforters" who were neither church officials nor educators. In fact, most of these "sick comforters" ended up being banished for such things as alcoholism and immorality (Ponelis,1993).

The Khoi, although allowed to go to the public school--consequently, few did--were not the target of Dutch assimilation. Khois were not considered to be "christianized", and their relationship with the white people was kept on a master/servant basis. As a result, most Khoi learned their broken form of Dutch from daily contact with those in the Dutch Town or Cape Town as it is called today (Ponelis, 1993).

Up until the late 1700s, Dutch colonists had the most impact on those within the Companyís reach in both language and culture. In 1795, the Dutch Company finally lost its hold on to the Cape when the British took over. The British occupation had an enormous affect on the development of the Afrikaans speech community which consisted of both white and black people (Van Deusen-Scholl, 1997). Under British rule, the church and educational systems underwent dramatic change. The British continued to allow the Dutch language to be spoken in church and they even provided for the distribution of Bibles translated into Dutch, although the Anglican church was being promoted, and English was the language for official correspondence. It was also during this time that Islam began to grow in popularity in some areas (Ponelis, 1993). This meant that the English had to contend with yet another new religion and new language system to keep their cultural hold on the cape.

The educational system also began to improve under the watchful eye of the English. The improvements were made mostly to further the use of the English language and customs, but, were, nevertheless, supported by the Afrikaans community (Ponelis, 1993).

(While I was unable to find through my research the exact time that Afrikaans became a separate, distunguishable language, I did find that the name "Afrikaner" was given to Dutch farmers known as "Boers" who refused to speak English as a rebuff to those upper class settlers who looked down on the Boers as an uneducated and ignorant group. From the term "Afrikaner" came the language name "Afrikaans" (Van Deusen-Scholl, 1997).)

During this time, immigration of Dutch citizens still continued. Those Dutchmen who did relocate to the Cape were of a higher caliber intellectually than those of the previous Company and added many academics, attorneys, entrepreneurs, and journalists to the ranks. The Dutch also controlled much of the media at this time which proved beneficial to the Afrikaans speaking public in later years. In fact, the first Afrikaans newspaper was originally a Dutch periodical (Ponelis, 1993).

By the late nineteenth century the occupied territory of the Cape had greatly expanded. This was due mainly to the Great Trek. The Great Trek was the result of the Difaqane/Mfecane which spread devastation from the Zulu territory on the east coast and into the whole eastern interior. This decimation of the Bantu speakers opened up a large new territory which over 6,000 whites moved in to claim. It was mostly at this time that Afrikaans was exposed to the Bantu languages (Ponelis, 1993).

Although these new lands proclaimed Dutch to be their official language, the British still had a strong hold on the majority of the Cape. But, the British plan to spread the English language seemed to backfire. With the tremendous influx of immigrants to the

Cape in the mid to late nineteenth century the Afrikaans population octupled from 22,000 to 160,000. Much of the increase in the Afrikaans speaking community could have been due to the high rates of intermarriage, although such marriages were kept out of the official statistics (Ponelis, 1993).

Afrikaans first became a written language during the 1850s when articles written in Afrikaans began appearing in newspapers. By 1861, the first book in Afrikaans--which consisted of a compilation of dialogues and letters--was published by L. H. Meurant. This great feat represented a struggle which began in 1825 to bring Afrikaans into the world of pen and paper. It is important to note that the early Afrikaans writing system has been adjusted a little to bring it to its present day form (Ponelis, 1993).

The twentieth century was even more momentous for the Afrikaans speaking community. In 1925, Afrikaans was recognized as an official language. (Currently, there are 11 official African languages. Afrikaans if topped only by Zulu and Xhosa in terms of number of speakers (Van Deusen-Scholl, 1997).) This was only the beginning for Afrikaans as a language culture. Throughout the century several more Afrikaans newspapers were born, a variety of books published and even a radio station took life. Perhaps, one of the greatest successes for Afrikaans came during the period between 1920-1930 when universities began instructing in Afrikaans (Ponelis, 1993).

However, the study of Afrikaans in the field of historical linguistics is full of disagreements as to the exact path of development followed by the Afrikaans language. As with other creolized languages, the explicit origins of the roots of Afrikaans is unknown, but many theories surround it.

One such theory was developed by Den Besten. He stated that the Khoi who had learned Dutch provided the foundation for Afrikaans. He believed that Khoi pidgin-Dutch ultimately led to the creolization of Afrikaans. This theory is not widely accepted, however, because most scholars believe Afrikaans did not exist until the mid to late nineteenth century, when the Khoikhoi language was no longer spoken. Scholars also argue that Den Besten placed his whole theory on a few meager sentences (Ponelis, 1993). (See appendix for an illustration of Den Bestenís theory.)

D. C. Hesseling, who is considered to be the real founder of Afrikaans historical linguistics, also believes Dutch to be the base for Afrikaans. He, however, theorizes the language contact between the Dutch and the slaves quickly led to a divergence from Dutch. He believes this change to be very rapid and due to internal forces. Hesseling also thought that since most slaves and maritime visitors brought the "Malayo-Portuguese" language with them, it also greatly influenced the development of Afrikaans and provided many of itís borrowed words. While Hesseling was considered to be a notable scholar in the field of historical linguistics his views began to be questioned in the mid 1900s (Ponelis, 1993). (See appendix for an illustration of Hesselingís theory.)

One such questioner was Scholtz. Scholtz believed that the seventeenth century Holland koine was the original base of Afrikaans. Holland koine was different from both pure Hollands (a northern Dutch dialect) and early Standard Dutch. Scholtz stated that this dialect was spoken in the northwest Dutch speaking areas including Amsterdam--the main source of the Dutch colonists at the Cape. He also points to the Holland koine names given to the flora and fauna on the Cape at the time of the early settlers. Below are some examples of Scholtzís argument (Gouws et al., 1992. pg. 84).

ENGLISH	KOINE	AFRIKAANS	STANDARD DUTCH
hand	hant	hand	hant
angry	kwa:t	kwaad	kwe:t
let	gelaten	gelaat	elaten

Even today scholars cannot agree on the direct and exact ancestry of Afrikaans, although most do believe some form of Dutch to be at the foundation. All scholars, however, will agree that Afrikaans is a language that includes extensive borrowings, which are the product of language and cultural contact. In fact, Afrikaans is believed to have borrowings from at least ten different languages (Ponelis, 1993). Almost all of these languages are Indo-European which drives to the conclusion that Afrikaans is also Indo-European. Below are some examples of borrowing. Keep in mind that these are only examples and are in no way indicative of a certain languagesí overall impact on and contribution to Afrikaans.

Examples of Borrowing in Afrikaans

Malay: kabaai ëgowní, klapper ëcoconutí, bapa ëfatherí (Ponelis, 1993 pg. 99)

Portuguese: baba ëbabyí, tamaai ëhugeí , tamanyu ësquidí (Ponelis, 1993 pg. 102)

Khoi: boegoe, dagga, kanna plant names, geitjie ëgeckoí, kamma ëbugí, trassie ëhermaphroditeí (Ponelis, 1993 pg. 104)

High German: Deetsemmer,Dezember ëDecemberí, blas ësallowí, vragwa ëtruckí (Ponelis, 1993 pg.105)

Low German: anforen (LG) = aanvoor(A) ëplow the first furrow, bangboks (LG) =banbroek (A) ëcowardí (Ponelis, 1993 pg. 105)

French: brief ëletterí, dosyn ëdození, medisyne ëmedicineí (Ponelis, 1993 pg.106) ( It is believed that the French borrowings were probably the result of earlier being borrowed by the Dutch since the French on the Cape had little influence on Afrikaans.)

Arabic: kifaayat ëfuneralí, rukuu ëbowí, waajib ëobligatoryí (Arabic words usually only appear in the southwestern Afrikaans among the Muslims.) (Ponelis, 1993 pg.107)

Bantu languages: Limpopo, Tugela toponyms, kaia ëshackí, pasella ëgiftí (Ponelis, 1993 pg. 107)

Dutch: bloemryke (D) = blomrke (A) ëfloweryí, houthakker (D) = houtkapper (A) naak (D) = kaal (A) (Ponelis, 1993 pg. 110) ( Keep in mind that Afrikaans is more similar to Dutch in vocabulary, phonology, and structure than any other language. In fact, around 95% of all Afrikaansí words are related to Dutch (VanDeusen-Scholl, 1997). In this data set it is apparent that sound changes did occur during the transference from one language to the other. Notice the change n to k, and k to p.)

English: Dit sal die dag wees ëThat will be the dayí, inferieur ëinferiorí, affaiëlove affairí (Ponelis, 1993 pg. 113) (English also greatly influenced many aspects of Afrikaans inclu_ing phonology, vocabulary, and structure. In fact, most speakers of Afrikaans also speak English.)

The complexity of Afrikaans is now readily apparent. And while it seems that no definite conclusions can been drawn there are some facts all scholars and historical linguists will agree on. First, it is known that Afrikaans is an Indo-European language and falls under the West Germanic branch. More specifically, it is a member of the Old Franconian off-shoot, just as Dutch is. (See appendix for a more specific illustration.) Second, most scholars will conclude that Afrikaans is most closely related to Dutch. The third fact that most scholars will agree to is that Afrikaans is a creolized language with extensive borrowings from a multitude of other languages brought about by language contact.

Ultimately, Afrikaans was sculpted from a world of intertwining language groups and emerged to be its own unique language and culture. Afrikaans is a success story of a patriotic people struggling to find something to call their own. And yet, it is still clothed in the robes of a mysterious past.