SECTION XII: PHONETIC PHENOMENA IN
LOAN-WORDS.
281. When a loan-word is taken up into an IN language, its sounds must accommodate themselves to the phonetic capacities of the language that accepts it. Exceptions are rare and are found mainly among educated persons; but here and there a foreign sound has persisted even in popular pronunciation. Madurese has no f, but loan-words containing that sound preserve it even in popular pronunciation “ pretty generally ” (Kiliaan).
282. The change of sounds takes place in certain cases because the recipient language absolutely does not possess the sound that occurs in the loan-word.
I. Loan-words from IN languages. The commonest case is that of the palatals, which are wanting in certain IN languages; they are replaced by a velar, a dental + i, or by the semi-vowel y. Table:
| Malay jambatan > Napu | gambata, “ bridge ”. |
| Malay janji > Sangirese | diandi, “ to promise ”. |
| Malay jaga > Tontemboan | yaga, “ watch, guard ”. |
II. Loan-words from non-IN languages. The commonest case is that of the various sibilants, as most of the IN languages possess only one, viz. s. Thus the Dutch sjaal, pronounced šāl, " shawl ", appears in Madurese as sal or cal.
283. The sound may occur in the loan-word in a position which it is not allowed to occupy in the recipient language. In Busang no word ends in s, Original IN r2atus, “ hundred ”, becomes atu, and hence Bugis > Bugit and English > Iṅgĕlit. The s has only persisted in kĕrtas, “ paper ”. — A particularly common case is that an IN language having only vocalic finals adds a vowel to loan-words that end in a con-
