Language of the Inventories
During the VOC period 17th century Dutch was the language generally spoken at the Cape by VOC officials and immigrants from Western Europe. The language officially used in the VOC and Batavian periods was the older version of modern Dutch of the Netherlands and Flanders, and of Afrikaans spoken mainly in South Africa. For this reason it should not be too difficult for speakers of modern Dutch and Afrikaans to understand the language used in the Inventories.
In most cases the inventories were written by officials in 17th and 18th century Dutch. But if the deceased at the time of his or her death lived somewhere in the districts and there was no official available to compile an inventory on behalf of the family, a family member, relative, friend or neighbour had to make a list of the possessions concerned. This ‘preliminary’ or unofficial inventory was mostly written in Cape Dutch, which deviated in some respects from Dutch spoken in the mother country. Rev. Leibbrandt commented as follows on Cape Dutch: “ ... how purely Dutch was generally spoken in the outer districts. It is true, people have no idea of the artificial declension of words, so that the mistakes made always apply to the singular, plural and gender; but it does not take away from it that the white population speak the language, and mostly in its antiquated form, remarkably well. Those who [ever] heard a speech or debate in the Synod or lower church meetings, will readily admit to this” (translated from Van der Merwe, 1971: 37).
When the inventory reached the Orphan Chamber at the Cape the scribes/officials copied the contents and in cases where Cape Dutch was used in the original version they usually corrected the language in their re-written copy in accordance with standard Dutch rules. A comparison between the official Dutch version and the original inventory in Cape Dutch reveals the differences in spelling and the lack of declension in the language used by locals. The two images show the editing done to MOOC8/19.48b.
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When one considers the Inventories of the Orphan Chamber it does not seem as if the British implemented a language policy of ‘only English’ in the documentation and official communication of this institution when they came into power in 1795. Judging by the language and style of the inventories compiled at the Orphan Chamber, one may conclude that most of the officials from the Dutch regime were retained. They continued reporting in what could be described as fairly good 19th century Dutch, although small deviations in some documents indicate that the scribe was not a mother-tongue speaker of Dutch. The same applied when these officials compiled inventories in English as their second or third language, because they made errors that are typical of non-mother tongue speakers.
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