End Notes

1. Ponttopidan writes "Die bin noodsaeklig na geestlige Sacken for volg die hollands Spraek, als the regte Oorsprong van die Creolese, so mi bin verpligt for giev een Waerskowing ookal, dat mi ka volg die selve Regel na deese Oversetting van die Nywe Testament. Mi ka volg die Creolese Spreek-Manier overal, maer mi no ka wil gebryk di Woorden en Spreeken, vordiemaek die no pa na een geestlig Materie" (298).

2. Johan Nicolai Madvid, 1804-1886, was an influential Danish philologist and politician."

3. That is the proportions of Negerhollands words derived from lexicon in each of these languages is reflected by the order in which Pontoppidan lists them.

4.Valls (1981) identifies mumbo jumbo as an apocryphal deity supposedly worshiped in Africa. Katya Leney, in a message posted to the H-net List for African History (1/23/98), suggests that wide-spread use of the term probably can be attributed to the popularity of Mungo Park's narrative in which he relates a tale concerning the fettish Mambo Jambo. The tale "was so confusing to [Park's] European audience that the corrupted term came to represent religious or ritual confusion generally."

5. An anonymous reviewer of this translation suggests that the hyphen should be interpreted as indicating lexicalized forms. If this was Pontoppidan's intent, it is not clear why gurrugurru is represented as one word. Additionally, we would caution readers that the last speaker consistently used frufru 'morning' and wawa `truth.'

6..This is an error. He means guNgu `huge, a lot'.[where N = eng].

7 .Pontoppidan translates this somewhat liberally. Suk means to `look for, try to get' as is shown in several of the other proverbs which he presents; tu means to close, to cover, to cover up. A more literal translation is `fowl looks for the basket, the basket covers him,' that is, failure to attend to one's circumstances could land one in a difficult situation.

8.This is probably a printer's error as Pontoppidan writes geambó in his 1881 article.

9. The 1881 article has Blau diffie seg: wen regen caba, mi sal bau mi eigen hus.

10. The 1881 article has Pobre folluk no fo ha hart bran.

11.That is poverty is not good.

12.Schuchardt 1914 suggests the "o" in flegon is not a typographical error. Pontoppidan documents this form both here an in his 1881 article, suggesting t that flegon is a variant of flegen.

13. Literally ...because s/he has found it sweet.

14. This is changed from the 1881 article where Pontoppidan gives Ekke man suk sji eigen wif.

15. This appears to be an error in which kuri 'run' is substituted for guri 'grow.' It is not clear whether this is a printing error or not.

16. This ka probably means can. That is it alternates with Negerhllands kan as in the following proverb.

17. Here ka likely is intended as either completive or as a perfect tense indicating that the fire goes out before the child jumps in the ashes.

18. The Negerhollands for rat is /roto/; the word for mouse is miši.

19. Vookal is a typographical error. The word is ookal (also oka) `also'.

WORKS CITED

Valls, Lito. (1981). What a Pistarkle! A Dictionary of Virgin Islands English Creole. St. John, U.S.V.I.

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