A Portugese Question

[A. G. Maisey]

Thanks for your response, Fernando.

Indonesian, which is a form of Malay, is my second language, and I can also handle Javanese passably.

"Sang" is not a root word in either Malay or Javanese. Certainly there are words in both languages that use "sang" as a part of the word; "sang" by itself is an honorific; "kur" and "kuh" are neither suffixes nor prefixes in either language.

Since the Portugese were the first Europeans into the region, it is possible that Javanese first encountered bayonets in the hands of Portugese people.

The Indonesian and Javanese words "sangkur" and "sangkuh" both mean "bayonet".

Sangkur, sangkuh, or any similar word does not occur in Old Javanese, which means it has been added to the Javanese language since about 1600.

In Portugese "sang" is a root word that is used to generate other words.This root word denotes some association with blood.

Bayonets by their very nature draw blood.

Yes, certainly I am drawing a long bow, and at the moment I am not of the opinion that "sangkuh" is Portugese generated , however logic seems to indicate that it could be a possibility, and without checking, we will never know.

If you have access to sources that will provide knowledge of 16th-17th century Portugese language usage, I would appreciate it if you could do a little checking. If you cannot do this fairly easily, don`t worry about it, I`ll go another route.

Incidentally, I`m not looking for corruption of a Portugese word, by Portugese, but rather a word that was in current usage in 16th-17th century Portugese, that could form the basis for a Javanese or Malay corruption.