Early Vocabularies of Malay

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03 April 2015

Early vocabularies of Malay

Among the Malay manuscripts in the British Library which have just beendigitised are a number of vocabulary lists and dictionaries in Malay, compiledby visitors to the region as aids to learning the language. The study of Malay inEurope dates back to the very first voyages to Southeast Asia in the 16thcentury, for Malay functioned as the lingua franca for the whole of thearchipelago, and was an essential business tool for both merchants in searchof spices and missionaries in search of souls.

Map showing the lands where the Malay language was used, from ThomasBowrey, A dictionary English and Malayo, Malayo and English (London, 1701).

British Library, 68.c.12

The earliest Malay book printed in Europe is a Malay-Dutch vocabulary by

Frederick de Houtman, published in Amsterdam in 1603, and an Englishversion of this Dutch work became the first Malay book printed in Britain in1614. However it was only in 1701 that the first original Malay-Englishdictionary was printed in London, the work of Thomas Bowrey (ca. 1650-1713), an East India Company sea captain, who explained in the Preface theurgent need for such a publication: “… I finding so very few English Men that

http://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/.a/6a00d8341c464853ef01b7c77198d5970b-pihttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c771976a970b-pihttp://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/asian-and-african/2015/04/propaganda-and-ideology-in-everyday-life-chinese-collection-posters.htmlhttp://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/asian-and-african/2015/03/what-to-give-the-english-king-who-has-everything.htmlhttp://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/asian-and-african/http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/asian-and-african/index.htmlhttp://www.bl.uk/index.shtml


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have attained any tollerable Knowledge of the Malayo Tongue, so absolutelynecessary to trade in those Southern Seas, and that there is no Book of thiskind published in English to help the attaining of that Language; TheseConsiderations, I say, has imboldened me to Publish the insuing Dictionary …”(Bowrey 1701). A draft manuscript version of Bowrey’s dictionary (MSS Eur A33), in his own hand and probably dating from the late 17th century, has justbeen digitised. It is probably the very volume which Bowrey mentions in thededication of his publication, “To the Honourable the Directors of the EnglishEast-India Company”: “The following Work was undertaken Chiefly for the

Promotion of Trade in the many Countries where the Malayo Language isSpoke, which your Honours having perused in Manuscript, were pleased toapprove of; and to Incourage the Publishing of it …”

Thomas Bowrey’s autograph draft of his Malay-English dictionary. British

Library, MSS Eur A33, pp. 6-7

After Bowrey’s pioneering work, it was not until the late 18th century thatBritish studies of Malay developed in earnest, through the efforts of the‘Enlightenment group’ of colonial scholar-administrators such as WilliamMarsden, John Leyden, John Crawfurd and Thomas Stamford Raffles. The

polyglot Leyden gathered together a vast array of linguistic materials, somecompiled in his own hand (Or. 15936) and others acquired from differentsources (MSS Malay F.2). Raffles too collected vocabularies from all over thearchipelago, including a Malay wordlist (MSS Eur E110) which appears to bein the hand of his Penang scribe Ibrahim; this volume is especially valuable for also containing an early register of inhabitants of Penang, listed by streetname, with details of origin, occupation, and family members. Raffles alsoobtained manuscripts as gifts, including a Malay-Javanese-Maduresevocabulary (MSS Malay A.3) from his good friend Pangeran Suta Adiningratof Madura. Finally, an English-Malay vocabulary (MSS Eur B37) is of unknown origin but includes at the end hospital lists of treatment with manyIndian names such as 'Singh', suggesting the owner might have been a

medical officer in the Indian army or of an Indian regiment in Southeast Asia.

http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Mss_Eur_B37http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=MSS_Malay_A_3http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/asian-and-african/2015/01/ibrahim-portrait-of-a-malay-scribe.htmlhttp://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Mss_Eur_E110http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=MSS_Malay_F_2http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Or_15936http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=mss_eur_a33_f006rhttp://a1.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c77197d1970b-pihttp://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Mss_Eur_A33


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A vocabulary of Dutch, English, Malay (Jawi script) and Malay (romanisedscript), provisionally dated to the 18th century on the basis of the Dutch andRomanised Malay handwriting. British Library, MSS Malay F 2, p. 4 (detail)

Vocabulary of Thai and Malay, compiled by John Leyden, early 19th c. British

Library, Or. 15936, f.69v (detail)

http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=or_15936_f069vhttp://a0.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b8d0fb2c10970c-pihttp://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=mss_malay_f_2_f004rhttp://a0.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01bb08158c08970d-pi


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Final page of a Malay-Javanese-Madurese vocabulary, early 19th c. British

Library, MSS Malay A 3, f.113v (detail)

Opening pages of a Malay-English vocabulary, with on the left-hand page thevariant forms (isolated, initial, medial and final) of the Jawi alphabet, early 19th

c., Raffles collection. British Library, MSS Eur E110, pp.2-3

http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=mss_eur_e110_f002rhttp://a7.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b8d0fb2c77970c-pihttp://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=mss_malay_a_3_f113vhttp://a2.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01b7c7719822970b-pi


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Early 19th-century register of the inhabitants in Love Lane, Penang, including a

Portuguese fisherman and his family of ten from ‘Junk Ceylon’ (Ujung Salang,or Phuket), who ‘came to the island with Mr Light’, i.e. Francis Light, in 1786.

British Library, MSS Eur E110, f.147r (detail)

English-Malay vocabulary, 19th century. MSS Eur B37, f. 1v (detail)

These manuscripts join three other Malay vocabularies digitised last year,and are listed below in approximate chronological order. Many other Malaymanuscript vocabulary lists are held in the British Library, often comprising onlya few pages within larger volumes, but all are detailed in a recently-publishedcatalogue (Ricklefs, Voorhoeve & Gallop 2014).

Digitised Malay manuscript vocabularies in the British Library:

Add. 7043, Malay grammar and vocabulary by William Mainstone, 1682,copied by John Hindley, early 19th c.

MSS Eur A33, Malay-English dictionary, by Thomas Bowrey, late 17th c.

Egerton 933, Two Malay vocabularies, 1731 and early 19th c.

MSS Malay F.2, Dutch-English-Malay vocabulary, ca. 18th c., Leydencollection.

Or. 15936, Various Malay vocabularies, early 19th c., Leyden collection.

MSS Eur E110, Malay-English vocabulary, early 19th c., Raffles collection.

MSS Malay A.3, Malay-Javanese-Madurese vocabulary, early 19th c., Raffles

http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=MSS_Malay_A_3http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Mss_Eur_E110http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Or_15936http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=MSS_Malay_F_2http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Egerton_MS_933http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Mss_Eur_A33http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=Add_MS_7043http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/asian-and-african/2014/09/a-new-catalogue-of-malay-and-indonesian-manuscripts-in-british-collections.htmlhttp://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/asian-and-african/2013/10/early-studies-of-the-malay-language.htmlhttp://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=mss_eur_b37_f001vhttp://a6.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01bb08158ce6970d-pihttp://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/Viewer.aspx?ref=mss_eur_e110_f147rhttp://a3.typepad.com/6a0192ac16c415970d01bb08158cf3970d-pi


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Soother of

sorrows or

seducer of

morals? The

Malay Hikayat

The Malay Tale

of the Wise

Parrot

From Anatolia

to Aceh:

Ottomans,

Turks and

Southeast Asia

collection.

Or. 4575, French-Malay vocabulary, early 19th c.

MSS Eur B37, English-Malay vocabulary, 19th c.

Further reading

Frederick de Houtman, Spraek ende Woord-boek in de Malaysche ende

Madagaskarsche Talen (Amsterdam, 1603). British Library, C.71.a.32 Augustus Spalding, Dialogues in the English and Malaiane languages(London, 1614). British Library, C.33.b.41Thomas Bowrey, A dictionary English and Malayo, Malayo and English(London, 1701). British Library, 68.c.12. Digitised version from the NationalLibrary of Singapore.

Annabel Teh Gallop, Early Malay printing 1603-1900 . An exhibition in theBritish Library 20 January to 4 June 1989.M.C.Ricklefs, P.Voorhoeve† and Annabel Teh Gallop, Indonesian manuscriptsin Great Britain: a catalogue of manuscripts in Indonesian languages in British

public collections. New Edition with Addenda et Corrigenda. Jakarta: Ecolefrançaise d’Extrême-Orient, Perpustakaan Nasional Republik Indonesia,

Yayasan Pustaka Obor Indonesia, 2014.

Annabel Teh Gallop, Lead Curator, Southeast Asia

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Posted by Annabel Gallop at 2:58 PM

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Digitisation, Indonesia, Javanese, Language studies, Malay, Printing,South East Asia

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Early Vocabularies of Malay