die creol taal

At the moment I have my autumn break. Time to scroll through notes I made about ‘strange’ things I found in the eighteenth century Carriols texts more than thirty years ago. My supervisor at the time, who later became my PhD advisor, Pieter Muysken, advised us to make notes about any unusual things in the manuscripts in addition to working on the database. A short note now caught my attention: could Carriols wee be a marker of perfect tense, with the same meaning as the much more common kabba?

The word wee is not frequently used, but almost always appears with the meaning ‘away’ as part of a compound verb (1) or as a fixed preposition with a main verb (2)

(1) Ms. 322 (1780) En Jesus a stier em met een wee van Em – ‘and Jesus sent him away from him.’ Du. wegsturen, ‘send away’.

(2) Ms. 322 (1780) Da Jesus a see na em: Skeer wee van mi, Satan! – ‘Then Jesus said to him/her: Scram from me, Satan!’ Du. expression scheer je weg! lit. ‘scram you away’.

In 1991, during the so called NEHOL-project of the department of General Linguistics (University of Amsterdam) we decided to digitalize the four versions of the Carriols Gospel Harmony as soon as possible. We thought is could be helpful for comparison and for diachronic study. We were then convinced these Gospel Harmonies of the Moravian Brethren were translations of Lieberkühn’s Die Geschichte unsers Herrn und Heilandes Jesu Christi aus den vier Evangelisten zusammen gezogen (Gnadau, 1769).

In section 25 of most of the Carriols Gospel Harmonies we find two sentences in which wee appears.

321: 25: (Johann Böhner, about 1780)

Waarlik, mi le see jender: sender hab al sender Loon wee.

Waarlik, mi le see jender*:/,* sender hab al sender Loon kabba.

‘Truly, I tell you: they have received their reward already.’

322: 25: (Johann Böhner, about 1780)

Voor Waar, mi le see na jender: sender hab al sender Loon wee.

Waarlik, mi le see na jender, sender hab al sender Loon wee.

3231: 25: (Johann Auerbach, before 1792)

Voorwaar, mi le see na jender: dat sender hab sender Loon kabba.

Voorwaar, mi le see na jender: Sen hab sender Loon wee, kabba.

3232: 25: (Anonymous, about 1795)

Voorwaar, mi see na jender: sender hab sender Loon wee.

Voorwaar mi see na jender, sender hab sender Loon wee.

3110: 25: (Anonymous, 1833)

Voorwaar mi see na jender: sender hab sender Loon wee.

Voorwaar mi see na jender, sender hab sender Loon wee.

It is interesting to see that the Creole word kabba (which appears in several Creole languages, like Sranan, and which is etymologically related to Iberian acabar) is used next to wee in the same section in two of the manuscripts.

Manuscript 321 is probably the second version of a translation of the Gospel Harmony by Johann Böhner and shows several examples of Böhner, as the author, trying to connect as good as possible to his audience of speakers of Carriols. Manuscript 3231 is an improvement of Böhner’s translation by Johann Auerbach, who got this task by the Moravian Brethren since the earlier translations did not connect well to their audience anymore. All other manuscripts show elements of so-called referee design: the translator remains closer to the original source text.

What about the bible translation of the Danish Lutheran mission, by J.M. Magens?

Mattheus 6: 16: (Magens, 1781)

waerwaer mie seg na jender, dat sellie hab sender Loon wej.

It also shows the strange form wej, the word wee according to Danish orthography.

Since wee is not used as kind of perfect tense marker in the rest of the manuscripts, we have to consult the possible source texts:

Statenvertaling (1637), Mattheus 6: 16: Voorwaer ick segge u dat sy haren loon wech hebben.

Lutherse vertaling (1648) Mattheus, 6: 16: Voorwaer Ick segge u: Sij hebben haren loon wegh.

Lieberkühn (1769), 25: Wahrlich, ich sage euch: sie haben ihren Lohn dahin.

Obviously, Carriols wee is a creolised form of Dutch weg ‘away’. The Woordenboek der Nederlandse Taal presents us the following meaning, See WNT, s.v. WEG (II), sub III, 8, Weghebben, ‘Vaak verbonden met AL of REEDS.’

‘To receive something’, already common in the 16th century, often connected with al or reeds (both ‘already’)

The strange form wee was not a Carriols word, but directly borrowed from the possible source texts. It is a good example of referee design: the translator wants to stay as closely as possible to the source texts. Therefore the word wee is not the remarkable word in this context, it is the use of kabba in manuscripts 321 and 3231. And the second example in 3231 even presents us insight in the way the translator Auerbach wanted to help his fellow brethren to connect to the audience of Carriols speakers by mentioning both words in the same sentence: Voorwaar, mi le see na jender: Sen hab sender Loon wee, kabba.

During the last, well more than, five years, Gylchris Sprauve (St. Thomas, USVI) worked on revitilazation of Virgin Islands Dutch Creole, or, as it is called in todays articles ‘Carriols’. Years ago we started zooming on a weekly basis to write and compose a book for the people of the US Virgin Islands with new and eighteenth century dialogues and related historical texts and to find ways to introduce this language in today’s Virgin Islands society.

Gylchris Sprauve, being an enthusiastic musician, collected some of the earliest Creole hymns, from 1749-1782, to sing in recent Christmas services and accompanied these with information about the language for the interested audience. On this website I referred to his initiative a few times.

On the other hand, wouldn’t it be nice to introduce the language in day to day life of the US Virgin Islands? On for instance Curaçao tourist are immediately welcomed with a sign in Papiamentu, wishing them ‘Bon bini’, wouldn’t it be nice to show the ones on the USVI a sign saying ‘Wandu frai’ (Have a good trip), or something alike.

Only a few days ago, Gylchris Sprauve introduced Virgin Islands Dutch Creole words in the social media, which will hopefully be used soon be used. Perhaps first these words will be used as a gimmick, but hopefully it will learn the people of the US Virgin Islands something about the language which was common in the eighteenth, nineteenth and, although less used, even in the twentieth century.

(c) Gylchris Sprauve.

As promised I regularly update the bibliography of Virgin Islands Dutch Creole. See the related page to find the version of May 2026.

In 1739, during the visit of the Count Nicolaus von Zinzendorff, two letters were written by enslaved members of the community of the Moravian Brethren. In the first letter, which was addressed to the Danish king, a group of enslaved people complained about their position in the Christian community. Despite being baptized, they were looked down upon by the colonists.

The second letter was written by Damma, also known as Marotta and Madlena. It consisted of two texts: one of them was written in an African language that was unknown to us until recently and the other was a translation of it into Virgin Islands Dutch Creole. In 1742 these letters were published and these were probably the first examples of texts in which enslaved people expressed their emotions in non-European languages.

The African letter of Damma remained a mystery and several scholars tried to unravel parts and pieces, using the Creole translation. Indications of possible West African languages were presented and published, but unfortunately, an undisputed language variant was lacking.

Version 1 of Damma’s letter. Courtesy of the Unitätsarchiv der Evangelischen Brüder-Unität, R.15.B.a.03.61_a-b

Two years ago Katharine Gerbner, assistent professor History of Religion at the University of Minnesota, formed a research group in which she, five linguists specialized in West African languages and Virgin Islands Dutch Creole and a historian specialized in the history of female enslaved in the Danish Westindies, worked together to translate the text, but also to portrait the writer of it.

The website which was constructed looks beautiful and consists of several related essays. The African letter is translated and Damma turned into a real person.

Please visit this website: http://www.newtermsfortheuniverse.org.

adga tome