Everything about The Old Malay totally explained
The
Old Malay is possibly the ancestor of
Malay language, including
Indonesian. It was heavily influenced by
Sanskrit, the
lingua franca of
Hinduism and
Buddhism, as most of the
Malays used to embrace these religions.
History
According to The Encyclopedia of Malaysia, vol. Languages & Literature, p22, p23, the history of written Malay dates back at least 1500 years, the history of
Malay language may be divided into four periods.
Old Malay
The oldest dated 682 CE, is the
Kedukan Bukit Inscription found near
Palembang, and several other inscriptions dating from 7th to 9th centuries have been found in
Sumatra, western
Java and others. These ancient texts are considered examples of 'Old Malay' or 'Early Malay'. All these inscriptions were in the form of Indian
Pallava script, characterized by extensive Sanskrit loan words, it lasted until 17th century.
Transitional Period
In the transitional period, the ‘Early Modern Malay’ was found at
Terengganu in the 14th century, the famous Batu Bersurat in
Arabic, and in within, there was a Malay
Kawi text of
Javanese mixed Arabic, found in the inscribed stones of
Pengkalan Kempas. The Batu Bersurat text has large number of Sanskrit terms which are now obsolete, it's a characteristic of Old Malay, the grammatical system is similar to modern Malay.
Malacca Period
At the
Sultanate of Malacca, Malay language develops rapidly in trade and the spread of Islam and Islamic literature, the development changed the nature of the language with massive infusion of Arabic,
Persian and later
Hindi vocabularies. The development slows down after 1511 with the fall of Malacca to Portuguese.
Late Modern Malay
Malay had developed into major language of
Southeast Asia in the 19th century, the language absorbed many loan words from
Portuguese,
Dutch and later
English, it became national languages of
Malaysia,
Indonesia and
Singapore after independence.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Old Malay'.
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