| Abstrakt: |
The first printed Dutch grammar was entitled Twe-spraack vande Nederduitsche letterkunst (1548). In many places, the grammar names its own language simply Duytsch, but the book also uses this term-depending on context or audience, not seldom melting one significance into another-for what now is known as 'Continental (West) Germanic' ("Ick spreeck int ghemeen vande duytse taal, die zelve voor één taal houdende", p. 110), referring to the entire complex of linguistic varieties, which nowadays come under the cognate standard languages Dutch (formerly in English Low/Nether Dutch) and German (High Dutch). Many textbooks, grammars, dictionaries etc. in 16th- to 18th-century Netherlands and Flanders strikingly reserved simple Duytsch for their own language (hence Dutch), contrasting it with 'marked' Hoogduytsch or even Overland(t)sch (avoiding hyperonymic -duytsch!). In addition to a treatment of the term Duytsch, this article also deals with some other, strongly related cruces in the Twe-spraack. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
