Papiamentu

E asuntu di Florisol-

The Calculus affair -

De zaak Zonnebloem

 

Papiamentu is a form of Creole indigenous to the Dutch Antilles, particularly Bonaire, Curacao, and Aruba, where it is considered the national language. It is also found in occasional use on Sint Maarten, Saba, and Statia. The term is a derivation of the old Spanish verb papear , which means to speak or converse.

Although there are numerous theories on the origins of Papiamentu, the most widely accepted explanation is that it is a Portuguese based Creole, traceable to the first contact between the Portuguese and West Africans in the mid-1400s. The Portuguese colonization of the West African coast prompted the evolution of a new language, one containing elements of African language structures and Portuguese vocabulary that allowed the two peoples to communicate with each other.

Shortly thereafter, the Portuguese commenced the slave trade, shipping human cargo from the West African coast to the Americas. Gathered from all over West Africa, the slaves did not even share a common language, as they spoke dialects that varied considerably by region. To communicate with one another, as well as with the Portuguese, they slowly started to acquire the coastal Creole during the many months they were held in West African ports awaiting passage across the Atlantic. This lingua franca, which became the mother tongue of a new generation, evolved further as it was adapted to the particular linguistic environments in which the slaves found themselves. In many instances, the resulting Creole served as a secret language shared among the slaves, incomprehensible even to those owners who spoke Portuguese.