Shouldn’t one normally call German “Dutch” and speak of Dutchland or something?
And how did they come to call Dutch “Dutch”?
Was this caused by a mistake in history?
Answer
Hi Sander,
In the English online etymological dictionary (http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=dutch&searchmode=none) you can read that ‘Dutch’ in Middle English has indeed been used exclusively with regard to Germans from the end of the 14th century. became. But ‘Dutch’ is not only related to the Old High German word duit-isc, but also to the Middle Dutch word duutsch and it corresponds to the Old English þeodisc, which means ‘belonging to the people’ (compare with our Dutch word Diets). The Medieval meaning of ‘Dutch’ can also be found in Pennsylvania Dutch, which refers to the immigrants from the Rhineland and Switzerland.
In the 17th century, however, the meaning of ‘Dutch’ was narrowed to ‘belonging to the Netherlands’: after all, many eyes in England were focused on the Netherlands, which then emerged from the northern provinces of the Low Countries as an independent state and a formidable rival to England. became.
So no mistakes in history, but a normal narrowing of the meaning of a word (you may know the example of ‘courage’, which originally meant more broadly ‘state of mind’).
Sincerely,
Sonia Vandepitte
University College Ghent Translation Studies – Department of English
Ghent University – Department of Linguistics
Answered by
Dr Sonia Vandepitte
translation studies linguistics interpreting multilingual communication
http://www.ugent.be
.