Papiamento - History

History

The historical origins of Papiamento are still not very well known. It is disputed whether Papiamento originated from Portuguese or from Spanish. A summary of the century-long debate on Papiamento's origins is provided in Jacobs (2009a).

Historical constraints, core vocabulary and grammatical features that Papiamento shares with Cape Verdean Creole suggest that the basic ingredients are Portuguese, and that other influences occurred at a later time (17th and 18th century, respectively). The name of the language itself comes from papia ("to chat", "to talk"), a word present in Portuguese (um papo, "a chat") and colloquial Spanish; compare with Papiá Kristang ("Christian talk"), a Portuguese-based creole of Malaysia and Singapore, and the Cape Verdean Creole word papiâ ("to talk"), or elsewhere in the Caribbean (Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Cuba) "papiar" - to talk excessively (but also, "to eat": "papar" is Portuguese children's term for "to eat"). Spain claimed dominion over the islands in the 15th century, but made little use of them. In 1634, the Dutch West India Company (WIC) took possession of the islands, deporting most of the small remaining Arawak and Spanish population to the continent, and turned them into the hub of the Dutch slave trade between Africa and the Caribbean.

The first evidence of widespread use of Papiamento in Aruba can be seen through the Curaçao official documents in the early 18th century. In the 19th century, most materials in the islands were written in Papiamento including Roman Catholic schoolbooks and hymnals. The first Papiamento newspaper was published in 1871 and titled "Civilisado" (The Civilizer). "Civilizado" (stress on /za/) is Spanish and Portuguese for "civilized" but can also be understood as a suppressed final "r" in the word "Civilizador" (stress on /do/) (Civilizer).

An outline of the competing theories is provided below.