Dutch East Indies - Etymology

Etymology

The word Indies comes from Latin: Indus. The original name Dutch Indies (Dutch: Nederlandsch-Indiƫ) was translated by the English as the Dutch East Indies, to keep it distinct from the Dutch West Indies. The name Dutch Indies is recorded in the Dutch East India Company's documents of the early 1620s.

Scholars writing in English use the terms "Indiƫ," "the Dutch East Indies," "the Netherlands Indies," and "colonial Indonesia" interchangeably.

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