REFRAMING PRE-MODERN LANGUAGE
CONTACT THROUGH TRADE IN EASTERN
INDONESIA: JAVANESE LINGUISTIC INFLUENCE
IN THE MOLUCCAS

Antoinette Schapper, Maria Zielenbach

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Antoinette Schapper, Maria Zielenbach. REFRAMING PRE-MODERN LANGUAGE CONTACT THROUGH TRADE IN EASTERN INDONESIA: JAVANESE LINGUISTIC INFLUENCE IN THE MOLUCCAS. Journal of the Southeast Asian Linguistics Society, 2025. hal-05459759

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# REFRAMING PRE-MODERN LANGUAGE CONTACT THROUGH TRADE IN EASTERN INDONESIA: JAVANESE LINGUISTIC INFLUENCE IN THE MOLUCCAS

Antoinette Schapper

Lacito-CNRS & Australian National University

a_schapper@hotmail.com

Maria Zielenbach

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

maria.zielenbach@gmail.com

## Abstract

In the pre-modern period, Java and Javanese traders were at the center of a complex web of regional and long-distance trade networks extending from India and China to New Guinea. In particular, the Javanese were key players in the spice trade, transporting these from their native Moluccas to the world through the ports of Java. Despite the pivotal role of the Javanese in this trade for hundreds or possibly even a thousand years, the Javanese language has not been considered as a source for loanwords in the Moluccas. Rather, it has typically been assumed by linguists that Malay was the vehicle of transmission of loanwords in the Moluccas, including those with ultimately Javanese origins. This article challenges this prevailing narrative, showing that there is clear evidence for direct borrowing from Javanese. We show that many Javanese loanwords in the Moluccas have dispersed across the region under the influence of the powerful clove-trading sultanates, particularly Ternate and Tidore. Recognition of Javanese as an influential language in trade in the pre- and early-modern period represents an important reframing of eastern Indonesia's linguistic history.

**Keywords:** the Moluccas, pre-modern trade, language contact, loanwords

**ISO 639-3 codes:** jav, msa, tft, tvo

## 1 Introduction<fnref n="1" />

Before the arrival of European traders and colonists in the sixteenth century, the indigenous states of Java were at the center of a complex web of regional and long-distance trade networks extending from India and China to New Guinea (Wisseman Christie 1998). The ports along the north coast of Java were thriving entrepôts through which Javanese ships trafficked the spices of the Moluccas to the rest of the world (Donkin 2003).

Whilst the importance of the Javanese in pre-modern shipping and trade in Island Southeast Asian has long been recognized by historians and archaeologists, linguists have paid little attention to the role that the Javanese language may have played in this early trade. Instead, focus has been on the spread of Malay as a trade language and the associated rise of vehicular varieties of Malay in the Moluccas, a process which likely had only just begun at the time of the European arrival, but which accelerated considerably following it (Blagden 1930, Collins 2003a). The assumption that Malay was the vehicle of transmission for loanwords in the Moluccas, including those with ultimately Javanese and South Asian origins, has persisted in the literature with relatively little scrutiny or reflection on the historical context. For instance, in a recent summary of loanwords from South Asian languages in Island Southeast Asia, Hoogervorst (2023:46–47) observes that the Ternate, Galela, and Biak have loans from South Asia “where Malay played a key role in the transmission”.

<footnote n="1">¹ Research for this article was supported by the OUTOFPAPUA project funded by the European Research Council (grant agreement no. 848532). Many thanks to Sander Adelaar who commented on earlier versions of this article. We are also thankful to Erik Zobel with whom we discussed several of the loanwords treated in this article. All errors are our own.</footnote>
Similarly, discussing loanwords in Asilulu, a language of the central Moluccas, Collins (2003b:xxiv) writes
“Malay has been the medium through which most of these loanwords entered Asilulu ... [reflecting] [t]he
ancient and persistent role of Malay in Maluku ...”.

This article challenges the prevailing narrative in which loanwords are assumed to have Malay as their
source, despite the fact that Java and Javanese traders were central to the pre- and early-modern spice trade in
the Moluccas. We look at linguistic evidence for the period of Javanese trade in the Moluccas and identify
Javanese loanwords across the Moluccas, but particularly centered on Halmahera in today's North Moluccas.
We show that there are particular concentrations of Javanese loans in domains connected with the courts of
the sultanates of Ternate and Tidore, and with trade items consumed and distributed by them. The Papuan
languages—also called Ternate and Tidore—that were spoken by these sultanates were influential in the
Moluccas, and through them, we argue, Javanese loanwords circulated widely in the region. Further, we show
that whilst Malay words for trade items have in some cases displaced Javanese ones, Javanese loans can still
be found in languages at the fringes of the Moluccas, where they represent remnants of an older Javanese loan
stratum.

The structure of the article is as follows. Section 2 overviews the historical evidence for Javanese trading with the Moluccas. Section 3 considers the evidence for direct lexical borrowing from Javanese in the Moluccas. We show that for some loans Javanese, often specifically Old Javanese, is the only possible source, while in other cases Javanese is a better or at least as good source candidate as Malay. We do not present all possible Javanese borrowings we have identified. Rather, particular examples have been selected on the basis of their ability to illustrate the main issues and tendencies which present themselves in the Moluccan data. In section 4, speech levels in the Moluccas are discussed as further evidence of Javanese linguistic influence in the region. Section 5 concludes.

## 2 Trade between Java and the Moluccas

In the political and cultural history of insular Southeast Asia the influence of the Javanese looms large. The commercial activities of the early indigenous Javanese states, particularly their involvement in the spice trade, saw the Javanese assume a very substantial role in the transiting of goods over long distances between the Indian Ocean, the South China Sea and across the Indonesian archipelago from the middle of the first millennium up until early-modern times. One of the most important places in eastern Indonesia in which the Javanese carried out trade was the Moluccas, specifically several small satellite islands around Halmahera.<fnref n="2" /> The Javanese were drawn to the Moluccas by cloves (*Syzygium aromaticum*), the fragrant flower buds of a tree of the myrtle family used as an ingredient in medicines, cosmetics, and food. Only naturally occurring on parts of Halmahera and the small islands around it, references to cloves and the Moluccas in historical documents suggest that the trade was already in full swing by the twelfth century, and probably dates back much further, to at least the 10th century (van Fraassen 1987:30, Donkin 2003:164).

The thirteenth-century Chinese Chronicle Zhū Fān Zhi by Zhao Rukuo mentions Wu-nu-ku, a place name which has been identified as the Moluccas (Ferrand 1919:281; Hall 1964:69; Coedès 1968:186–187), among the vassals of the Kediri Kingdom of Java (1042–1222). The Moluccas are mentioned among the tributaries of the Javanese Majapahit empire in the fourteenth-century Javanese text the *Nagarakrtāgama* (1293–1725, see Pigeaud 1960:12). According to Valentijn (1724:137), the reign of Ternate king Cili Aiya/Sidang Arif Malamo (ca. 1322–1331) saw the arrival of many Javanese and Arabic traders in the Moluccas:

> In his time a great many Javanese and Arabs came and established themselves in Ternate for the purpose of acquiring cloves, or for other reasons. Because of this, trade flourished and the power of this ruler expanded considerably. (Valentijn 1724:137)

Although the relationship was never one of true vassalage, these references make clear that Java and the Moluccas were in contact with one another at an early time.

<footnote n="2">² The “Moluccas” is a term which originally referred purely to a small group of islands around Halmahera in which cloves were endemic (van Fraassen 1987:16). The term was later expanded to refer to the whole Spice Islands region, from Halmahera to the eastern tip of Timor. The original Moluccas are now usually referred to as the “North Moluccas”.</footnote>
Javanese merchants sailed the archipelago, collecting forest products and minerals from various places in Island Southeast Asia, from the Malay peninsula to Timor and certain Philippine islands. A tenth-century inscription refers to *banigrāma* ‘merchant’ groups operating out of a port in eastern Java who ‘encircle the sea, who sail the length of the sea’ (Wisseman Christie 1998:244). The products were traded onwards from ports like Tuban and Gresik in eastern Java. Hence, Java became the principal intermediate marketplace through which Moluccan cloves and other spices reached the wider world (Wheatley 1959, van Leur 1955). This gave rise to the erroneous idea in some early works that Java was the original home of the spice. For instance, Marco Polo (1903:272) claims that Java “produc[es] black pepper, nutmegs, spikenard, galingale, cubebs, cloves, and all other kinds of spices.” In later works, this error is corrected, painting a picture of a vibrant trade in cloves conducted out of the Moluccas by the Javanese. For instance, in the *Conquista de las Islas Molucas* (1609), Bartolomé Leonardo de Argensola places the Javanese as central players in distributing cloves from the Moluccas to the world:

> Some affirm, That the People of the Molucco Islands are Descended from the Jaos [Javanese], who settled there, being invited by the Fragrancy of the Spice. They loaded their Vessels with Cloves, till then unknown, and holding on that Trade, carry’d it to the Gulphs of Arabia, and Persia. They Sail’d about all those Countries, transporting Silks, and Porcelance, the Product, and Manufacture of China. The Cloves were by the Persians, and Arabs transmitted to the Greeks, and Romans. (De Argensola 1708:9, from the first English translation by John Stevens)

The trade as it existed at the time of the coming of the Portuguese is described in detail by Tomé Pires. Javanese ships sailed along the coast of Java and thence to Makassar before setting course northwards to the Moluccas. The sultanates of Ternate and Tidore were the main trade centers of the trade in cloves. Ships could reach Ternate directly, while Tidore relied on Makian as its main trading point since it had no suitable harbor. The sultanates had widespread alliances across the clove-producing Moluccan islands and cloves would be delivered to them on a regular basis (Pires 2010:217–218). From this centralized trade, De Argensola (1708:36) observed that ‘[t]he Crop of Cloves makes the Wealth of the Molucco Kings, much more than the Taxes their Subjects pay.’

In exchange for cloves, traders brought foreign goods, often luxury items, to the Moluccas. Pires writes that cloves were exchanged for metals, weapons, and fine cloth from India (Pires 2010:216). The Spaniard Duarte Barbosa reported that high-end trade goods, particularly Javanese gongs, were highly desired by Moluccan elites:

> Hither every year come ships from Malaca and Jaoa [Java] to take cargoes thereof. In exchange they carry thither copper, quicksilver, vermillion, Cambaya cloths, *cummin*, some silver, porcelain, metal bells from Jaoa as large as great basins ... The Kings and great men set great value on these and keep them both great and small as a treasure and estate. [...] And for these goods they give such and such a quantity of cloves. For a bell or a porcelain bowl if it is large they give twenty and thirty *quintals* and for one bell twenty *baares*, ... (Barbosa 1921:202–203, translated by Mansel Longworth Dames)

By the time the first Europeans arrived in the Moluccas, traders from many places, not just Java, were regularly present in trading hubs like Ternate (van Fraassen 1987:31). Pires reports that Javanese, Malay, and maybe even Indian traders lived on Ternate (Pires 2010:214). When Francis Drake visited Ternate in 1578, he met Byzantines, Turks, an Italian, and a Spaniard (Drake 1854:143). In his *Memorie van Overgave* of 1682, Governor Robert Padtbrugge describes the Moluccas as an international hub in which people blended together:

> [I] am convinced [...] that the Moluccas consist of a melting pot of different peoples and races, descendant for the most part from Chinese and Japanese, and then from Macassarese, Borneans, Javanese, Malays, Arabs, and Mamaluks, Persian, Indians as well as from coastal Moors and heathens who through need or necessity, are enticed and driven thither by the trade in the precious spices. (Padtbrugge 1682:260–261, quoted from van Fraassen 1987:31)

Despite the diversity of people present in the Moluccas in the early-modern period, it is nonetheless clear that the Javanese maintained a position of cultural pre-eminence among them. The anonymous author of the *Treatise on the Moluccas* (ca 1544) relates that the people on Ternate reported that they were converted to Islam by the Javanese, adopted titles from them, and even claimed Javanese ancestry:

> The kings and their brothers and sisters, the *sengadjis* and their children, bear titles: the men that of *kaitjil* [quachil], the women that of *naitjil* [nachil]. Only his brothers and sisters, the dukes and their heirs direct, can
be called by such a title in the presence of the *kolano*; nobody else may bear it when near the king. They say
that they took these titles from the Javanese who made them Muslims and introduced coinage into their country,
as well as the gong, the *serunai* [syroneos], ivory, the *kris* [crises] dagger, and the law, and all the other good
things they have. They boast of having descended from that race, [...] (Jacobs 1971:105)

European powers worked to establish monopolies on the clove trade and expel all Asian traders including the Javanese. The Portuguese attempts to destroy the existing trade networks in the sixteenth century were only partially successful, eliminating much of the trade of others with the sultanates, but not elsewhere. Instead, the Javanese now bought cloves from intermediaries on Ambon (see van Fraassen 1987:41–42) or places in the Moluccas which remained unaligned with one of the sultanates. De Argensola expresses his frustration at this continuing trade with the Javanese:

> Among the Moluccos there are many Islands subject to their own Chiefs, full of excellent Waters, and delightful Banks. [...] They yield above 2000 Hundred Weight of Cloves Yearly; which the Jaos [Javanese] are Masters of, none being to obstruct them; they go over and Barter, and carry it away in their Junks. (De Argensola 1708:9, from the first English translation by John Stevens)

When the Portuguese were ejected from Ternate in 1575, many indigenous groups who were accustomed to trade there slowly began to return. A Spanish report from 1584 recounts that the clove trade in Ternate was lively, with around a thousand Javanese, Sangleys (Chinese Filipinos), and Acehnese arriving to trade (Colin and Pastells 1900–1902:41, cited from Andaya 1991:82). In August 1599, the first Dutch ship reached Ternate under the command of Wybrand van Warwijck. Included in the account of the voyage is a *Vocabulaer vande Javaensche ende Malaysche woorden* [vocabulary of Javanese and Malay words] that was compiled on Ternate (van Neck 1648:43ff), possibly indicating that Javanese was still known in the Moluccas at that time. In the early seventeenth century, the Dutch were able to establish a monopoly over the clove trade by exercising violent suppression (see van Fraassen 1987:48–52), thereby bringing hundreds of years of Javanese participation in the Moluccan clove trade came to a close in the 1650s.

### 3 Identifying Javanese loanwords in the Moluccas

The abundant historical evidence of trade between Java and the Moluccas means that loanwords are to be expected. The fact that linguists have not identified them in the first place reflects the dominant narrative of Malay as the primary language of transmission of loanwords in eastern Indonesia. The complexity of differentiating lexemes originating in Javanese from those originating in Malay has almost certainly further contributed to a convenient, yet facile reliance on Malay-centric scenarios for loanword transmission. Not only have Javanese and Malay exchanged many loanwords between themselves (Poedjosoedarmo 1982), but they both also evidence significant numbers of parallel loans from South Asian languages (Gonda 1973). Knowing which language was the immediate source of loans into the languages of the Moluccas can be challenging, especially when individual loans are considered in isolation from one another rather than as part of a wider pattern of borrowing, and when the issue of loans and their sources are approached in isolation from the historical data.

To illustrate this problem, let us begin by considering the example of Old Javanese *salaka* ‘silver’ and Malay *səlaka* ‘silver’, originally from Sanskrit *śalākā* ‘chip, blade of straw, k.o. coin’ (Mahdi 1994:185–188, Mahdi 1996). Mahdi (1994) argues convincingly that forms reflecting *salaka* for ‘silver’ were earlier in Island Southeast Asia, but were to a large extent replaced by forms reflecting *pirak* dispersed by Malay traders beginning sometime after the fourth century. For those regions significantly beyond the Malay homelands, spread of *pirak* from Malay can only have begun around the fourteenth century when the Malays increasingly entered into long-distance trade as the power of Java began to wane. One of the regions where this replacement did not happen was the Moluccas. Forms reflecting *salaka* are the only term for ‘silver’ in much of Moluccas (Map 1).<fnref n="3" /> Where did these forms come from? Mahdi (1994) is unequivocal in his view that Malay-speaking traders were responsible for the spread of the term. Hoogervorst (2023:47) seems to adopt a similar position, maintaining that Biak loans its form *saraka* ‘silver, silver bracelet’ from Malay *səlaka*.

<footnote n="3">³ In some languages, there has been a semantic shift whereby reflexes of *salaka* ‘silver’ have come to mean ‘silver armband/bracelet’ or simply ‘bracelet’. Numerous languages have both meanings.</footnote>
<figure><img src="image_2.png" /><figcaption>Map 1: Relative distributions of reflexes of *salaka (green) and *pirak (blue) in eastern Indonesia</figcaption></figure>

Given what we know about the trade networks in the pre-modern and early-modern periods, the distribution of *salaka forms is strongly indicative of influence emanating from the powerful trading sultanates, particularly Ternate and Tidore. On the one hand, the eastwards dispersal of *salaka terms into the Raja Ampat islands and Cenderawasih Bay follows the well-defined routes used by the tributaries of the sultanate of Tidore, particularly the Biak (see Schapper and van Schie, forthcoming, on the importance of the Biak for carrying loanwords eastwards from Halmahera). The dispersal along the east coast of Sulawesi and into the central Maluku Islands tracks with the tributaries of the sultanate of Ternate. Forms reflecting *salaka, among others, reached the Bomberai Peninsula and the islands of the Alor archipelago in the south by means of well-known trade relationships with speakers of Seram Laut languages, like Geser (Ellen 2003). In short, the distribution of *salaka in eastern Indonesia today reflects the documented early-modern trade routes and the intergroup relationships of those times.

The question remains: where did the forms reflecting *salaka in the languages of Halmahera, particularly Ternate and Tidore, come from? On the purely formal linguistic evidence, there would on the face of it appear to be no strong reason to choose one of Malay səlaka ‘silver’ and (Old) Javanese salaka ‘silver’ over the other. However, as we shall see in the following sections, there is substantial evidence in the Moluccas for borrowing specifically from Javanese that brings the assumption of Malay as the source for the Moluccan instances of *salaka into question. In what follows we set out the evidence for loaning specifically from Javanese, rather than from or via Malay.

**3.1 Javanese-specific lexemes loaned and their semantic domains**

The first piece of evidence which can be adduced for specifically Javanese lexical influence in the Moluccas comes from a range of loanwords from Javanese which are unattested in Malay. Javanese loanwords show strong semantic clusterings which must reflect contact events centered on trade and elite cultural exchange. Indeed, many of the loans denote items known from the historical record to be traded in the pre- and early-modern period.

Among the body of Javanese loans in the Moluccas are numerous items that are notable for their absence from modern forms of Javanese. That is, many of the loanwords we have identified are—as far as we have been able to establish—from the Old Javanese period. This places the contact between Java and the Moluccas which resulted in the loans in the pre-modern period. A few examples of this type are set out in (1).

(1) Some Old Javanese loanwords in the Moluccas
Old Javanese *saragi* 'copper kettle or pot; musical instrument, prob. a kind of (copper) gong' > Ternate *saragi*, Tidore *saragi*, Sahu *saragi*, Pagu *salagi* 'k.o. large gong', Taliabu *saragi*, Sula *sarag*.

Old Javanese *sure* 'a particular kind of metal' > Ternate *sori* 'tin, lead, silver paper', Galela *sori*, Modole *hori*, Pagu *sori*, Tobelo Boeng *hori*, Gamkonora *sori*.

Old Javanese *padamaran* 'lamp-stand'>?<fnref n="4" /> > Ternate *padamara* 'oil lamp',<fnref n="5" /> Tidore *padamara*, Galela *padamara*, Tobelo *padamara*, Loloda *padamara* 'light', Buli *padamara* 'lamp, torch of resin, dammar', Gebe *padamara* 'candle', Sawai *padamara* 'lantern', Sula *padamara* 'torch', Sougb *pādōmárā*, Biak *padamara*, Wamesa *padamara*, Ansus *padamara*, Serui-Laut *padamara*, Kurudu *padamara* 'light', Wooi *padamara* 'kerosene pressure lantern', Yawa *padamara*, Moor *padamāra* 'gas lantern', Tandia *padamara* 'lamp'

The preservation of these Old Javanese loanwords in the Moluccas seems to have been, at least in part, the result of semantic shifts whereby meanings of loanwords were updated with technological changes, rather than replaced with new lexemes. For example, *padamaran*, which seems to have originally referred to a resin- or oil-burning lamp, is extended to refer to candles or, in some cases, to modern kerosene lamps and lights in some languages. These adaptations mean that *padamaran* is one of the most widely dispersed Old Javanese loans in the Moluccas (Map 2). Loans of it follow the expected lines out of the Moluccas southwards and eastwards, being particularly prominent in Cenderawasih Bay, where the lexeme was spread via Biak and then farther via Wamesa.

<figure><img src="image_3.png" /><figcaption>**Map 2:** Distribution of loans of Old Javanese *padamaran* 'lamp-stand?' in eastern Indonesia</figcaption></figure>

In some cases where a form is attested in Old Javanese and continued in Modern Javanese with minimal phonological and semantic differences, it is not possible to say whether Old Javanese or Modern Javanese is the source. For example, Old Javanese *salö* ~ *salu* 'shelter, pavilion' is continued as Modern Javanese *salu* 'verandah, bench on a verandah'. Loans in the Moluccas—Tabaru *salu* 'traditional meeting house', Loloda

<footnote n="4">⁴ Note that the root here is likely to be a borrowing of (Old) Malay *damar* < PMP *damaR* ‘tree resin used in torches’ (see discussion in Section 3.2 on the reflexes of PMP *R). However, the formation is still unique to Old Javanese, thereby not diminishing the fact that this is an Old Javanese loan.</footnote>

<footnote n="5">⁵ The reader will notice here and elsewhere that final (Old) Javanese *n* is typically lost in loans in the Moluccas. This is the result of a general pattern of loss of final consonants in Ternate and Tidore. Because of Ternate and Tidore’s role as vectors for loans, the loss of final *n* is often replicated in other languages through reborrowing of the Ternate/Tidore form. Occasionally, the earlier final nasal of the original loan form is preserved in some languages of eastern Halmahera and beyond.</footnote>
salu ‘village temple’, and Tobelo halu ‘village temple’—cannot easily be attributed to borrowing from one form of the language or the other, even though a Javanese source seems certain.

Javanese loans are strongly in evidence for plants and animals which are not native to the Moluccas as well as for the products derived from them. Examples are given in (2).

(2) Javanese loanwords for plants, animals, and derivative products in the Moluccas

Javanese gajih ‘fat, grease’ > Ternate gaji, Tidore gaji, Kao ma-gaji, Sahu gaji, West Makian gaji, East Makian gaji, Gane gaji, Patani gaji, Sawai gaji, Sula gaji.

(Old) Javanese galuga ‘variety of plant with red leaves, kind of red dye, red’ > Ternate galuga ‘kind of fruit from which a red dye can be extracted’, Tobelo galuga ‘kind of shrub with rough, angular, small fruits, to colour red with the small beans [of the galuga fruit]’.

Old Javanese gələpuŋ ‘rice-flour, powder’ > Tidore golopuŋ ‘flour’, Galela golopuŋ, Tabaru golopuŋu, Tobelo goopunu ‘meal, flour’.

Javanese jaran ‘horse’ > Ternate jara, Tidore jara, Tidore jara, Galela jara, Loloda jara, Modole jara, Kao jaraŋ, Pagu jaran ~ jaraŋ, Tabaru jara, Tobelo jara, Gamkonora jara, Sahu jara, Buli jara, East Makian jara, Gane jara ~ jaran, Maba jara, Patani jarak, Sawai jara, Taliabu jara.

(Old) Javanese kəbo ‘water-buffalo’ > Ternate kobo, Tobelo kobowo, Tabaru koboo, Galela kobowo, Loloda kobowo, Buli kobo, Maba kobo, Patani koba, Taliabu koboo.

Javanese luku ‘plough’ > Tidore luku, Muna luku.

(Old) Javanese mayana ‘a part. kind of plant and its flower, Coleus cutellenoides’ < Ternate mayana ‘k.o. plant, Coleus spp.’, Wamesa Windesi mayana rau ‘k.o. coleus plant’, Asilulu daun mayana ‘k.o. plant, the leaves of which are used for eye drops or as an ingredient in medicinal potions’.

Old Javanese manjaŋan, Javanese mənjaŋan ‘deer’ > Ternate manjaŋa ‘cow, deer’, Tidore manjaŋa, Galela maijaŋa, manjaŋa, Loloda maijaŋa, Pagu manjaŋa ~ mainjaŋa ~ moijaŋa, Tobelo manjaŋan ~ mainjaŋa, Sahu manjaŋa, Gamkonora manjaŋa, West Makian manjaŋa, Sawai manjaŋan ~ mənjaŋan, Buli manjaŋan, Gane manjaŋan, Maba manjaŋan, Patani manjaŋan, Asilulu manjaŋan, Larike manjaŋane, Sou Amana Teru manjaŋan, South Nuaulu maianane, Ambel manjaŋan, Moi menjana.

In general, botanical exchanges appear to have quite complex histories and there are numerous plant terms in the Moluccas that look to be ultimately from Javanese. The particular difficulties posed in this domain can be illustrated by comparing loanwords for the jasmine and moringa plants in Halmahera. (Old) Javanese mənur ‘jasmine’ looks to be the source for Ternate, Tidore, and several other Halmaheran languages’ form manuru ‘jasmine, Jasminum sambac’, but the final u is unexplained as is the adaption of ə with a instead of the expected o when a back vowel is in the following syllable (cf. ‘flour’ and ‘buffalo’ in 2). By contrast, (Old) Javanese kelor ‘drumstick tree, Moringa oleifera’ has been loaned into Ternate as kelo, notably without the final r. Deletion of final r is not unexpected given Ternate’s preference for open syllables and the loss of other word final consonants in that language. What is difficult to explain here is the different treatment of final r when borrowing (Old) Javanese mənur and kelor in Halmahera. One explanation could be that borrowing was through one or more intermediates in one of these cases. For instance, borrowing through an intermediate language with paragogic vowels and with ə > a could explain the preservation of the final r in the jasmine terms in Halmahera. However, at present, we have insufficient data to know how (Old) Javanese loans with final consonants other than n were adapted when borrowed in the Moluccas.

Another semantic domain in which loanwords from Javanese are recurrent in the Moluccas has to do with the courts of the sultans of Ternate and Tidore. The terms for court buildings and courtly practices such as those in (3) give a flavor of the kinds of borrowings from Javanese found in this domain.
(3) Javanese loanwords and the Moluccan courts

Javanese *kadaton* ‘royal palace’ (cf. Old Javanese *kadatwan*) > Ternate *kadato* ~ *kadatu* ~ *kadaton* ~ *kadatuŋ* ‘palace of the Sultan of Ternate’, Tidore *kodato*, Buli *kadato* ‘regal home, palace of the Sultan of Tidore’, Galela *kadato* ‘palace’, Tabaru *kadato*, Tobelo *kadato*, Sawai *kadatoy*.

Old Javanese *paseban* ~ *pasewan* ‘place for audience, audience-hall’ > Ternate *paseba* ‘large shed without walls in which those who came to present their respects to the Sultan had to wait for their turn’, Buli *paseba* ‘front porch of a house, meeting place’.

Javanese *suba* ‘to receive, welcome with honour’ (cf. Old Javanese *s<in>uba-suba* ‘to reward, regale, honour in a fitting manner ?’ < Sanskrit *śubha*) > Ternate *suba* ‘pay homage, honour, pay respect to, ask a father for his daughter in marriage by kneeling in front of him and grasping his ankles’, Tidore *suba* ‘greet, praise’, Galela *suba* ‘honour, respect (with a genuflection or kneeling down with the hands held together and raised up before the face), worship’, Pagu *suba* ‘worship’, Tabaru *suba* ‘worship’, Tobelo *suba* ‘polite bowing, as humble greeting’, Sahu *suba* ‘fold the hands in respectful greeting of the sultan’, East Makian *suba* ‘bow (gesture of obeisance)’, Ma’ya *suba* ‘expressing a greeting’, Biak *suba* ‘respect, make a sembah, pay homage’.

Without doubt the greatest concentration of Javanese loans is among the titles and names for members of the courts of the sultans of Ternate and Tidore. Almost all the Moluccan terms for courtly roles which are recorded have an identifiable (Old) Javanese source, as given in (4). Of course, noble titles were widely borrowed by leaders of indigenous states in the early-modern period (for example, both Bugis and Bima have *saŋaji*). It is at least theoretically possible that the courtly designations came to the Moluccas indirectly through contacts with other groups who had also given themselves Javanese styles, including the Malay courts at Palembang, Banjar, and Brunei, among others. The problem with such a scenario is that, apart from Javanese, we are not aware of other languages which have the full suite of terms attested in the Moluccas. Positing pre-modern borrowing from multiple different groups would therefore represent a more complex scenario for which there is no historical support.

(4) Javanese loanwords for Moluccan courtly titles and roles

Old Javanese *baru-baru* ‘a category of religious persons’ > Ternate *baru-baru* ‘soldiers of the Sultan, armed escort of a messenger of the Sultan, watchman, messenger’, Galela *baru-baru* ‘police officer, attendant or servant of a chief’, Loloda *baru-baru* ‘police officer’, Tobelo *baro-baro* ‘kind of Ternate civil servant’.

Old Javanese *dayaŋ* ‘female (of an animal or bird), prostitute’ > Ternate *dayaŋ* ‘female servant at the court who amongst other duties was responsible for the bodily relaxation of the Sultan’, Tidore *dayaŋ* ‘female servants’.

Javanese *kyai cili(k)* ‘honorific.male.title little’ > Ternate *kaicili* ~ *kaicil* ‘(grand)son of the sultan born of his main wife’, Tidore *kaicili* ‘prince’, Loloda *kaicili* ‘sovereign, prince’.

Javanese *nai cili(k)* ‘honorific.female.title little’ > Ternate *naicili* ‘princess’.

Old Javanese *raŋga* ‘functionary of high rank at the court’ > Ternate *roŋa* ‘rank’, *roŋa-roŋa* ‘high-ranking civil servants of the sultan, dignitaries of the sultanate’. (Unexpected *a* > *o*, likely due to contamination from Ternate *roŋa* ‘name’ < Proto-Core North Halmahera *roŋa* ‘name’ (Zielenbach ongoing))

Javanese *saŋ aji* ‘honorific.article king’ > Ternate *saŋaji* ‘chief of a soa, village, or district, Tidore *saŋaji* ‘district head’, Galela *saŋaji* ‘prince’, Tabaru *saŋaji* ‘district head’, Tobelo *saŋaji* ‘district chief’, Gamkonora *saŋaji* ‘traditional cultural leader’, West Makian *saŋaji* ‘district head’, Buli *saŋaji* ‘monarch, head of the district, chief’, Maba *saŋaji* ‘sort of first minister’, Sawai *saŋaji* ‘sort of first minister’.

Old Javanese *seba* ‘serve’ (evidenced in a range of derived forms, e.g., *aseba*, *aseseban*) > Ternate *sō-seba* ‘page, court dignitaries who walk behind the Sultan carrying his walking stick, sable, betel box and spittoon, etc.’ (Reduplication with Cō is a productive deverbal nominalization strategy in Ternate and other North Halmahera languages).

Old Javanese *(a)sədahan* ‘having a (special) task, charged with’ > Ternate *sadaha* ‘title of a court official in the house of the Sultan of Ternate’, Buli *jou-sada* ‘official of the sultan’, Wamesa Wandamen *sada* ‘honorary title’.
Also worthy of mention here is the term *kolano* ‘chief’, the only Moluccan title to have been discussed in previous literature. Watuseke (1977) points out the widespread dispersal of *kolano* and argues that it spread from Ternate and Tidore, but goes back to Javanese *kəlɔŋə* ‘wanderer, knight errant’ (< Old Javanese *kalana*, < Sanskrit *khelana* ‘to move to and fro’). Mahdi (1994:193) challenges the conclusions of Watuseke, asserting that deriving the Moluccan forms from Javanese *kəlɔŋə* is ‘unacceptable because the *a > ɔ* shift in Javanese took place relatively recently, and in any case postdates dispersal of the Tidore and Ternate form.’ This outright rejection of a Javanese origin for Moluccan *kolano* is, however, not entirely justified given that Javanese etymologies are indisputable in the case of the other titles. That is, the overall pattern of borrowing titles from Javanese adds weight to Watuseke’s initial suggestion. What is more, it is by no means certain when the rounding of Javanese *a* took place. The historical evidence makes clear that Javanese contact with the Moluccas spanned several hundreds of years, at least up until the early seventeenth century; borrowing of the Javanese term could have taken place as late as the fifteenth century, a time at which rounding may well have begun to occur. So, while the vowels of *kolano* do present some difficulties, Javanese remains the best source for the form.

Thus far we have only permitted Javanese loan etymologies where there have been relatively close form-
meaning matches between the posited Javanese sources and the Moluccan loans. If we allow for looser
semantic matches, a larger set of potential Javanese loans becomes apparent in the Moluccas. For example,
consider the proposed loans given in (5), all of which represent very good phonological, but poorer semantic
matches to the Old Javanese original. For example, in the case of Old Javanese *samara* ‘battle, battlefield’ the
semantics shifted to the tool used in a battle, i.e., a weapon.

(5) Some speculative Old Javanese loanwords in the Moluccas

Old Javanese *giŋa* ‘quality, excellence, talent, use’ > Ternate *gina* ‘load, cargo, luggage’, Tidore *gina* ‘possessions’, Galela *gina* ‘load, cargo, freight, luggage’, Pagu *gina* ‘load’ Tabaru *gina* ‘cargo’, Tobelo *gina* ‘load, cargo, contents of something’, West Makian Bobawa *gina* ‘cargo (of boat)’, Buli *gina* ‘goods, merchandise’, East Makian *gina* ‘stuff’, Sawai *gina* ‘things’.

Old Javanese *kagōŋan* ~ *kaguŋan* ‘greatness, largeness; overcome by, overpowered by’ > Ternate *kaguṇa* ‘large prahu for exclusive use by the sultan, state prahu’, Tobelo *kaguṇa* ‘very large proa’, Sahu *kagúṇa* ‘war canoe’.

Old Javanese *samara* ‘battle, battlefield’, *samarāŋga* ‘battlefield’ (< Sanskrit *samara* ‘hostile encounter, conflict, battle’ > Ternate *samaran* ‘long kind of machete’, Tidore *səmaraṇ* ‘sabre’, Sahu *semaraṇ* ‘kind of machete used as weapon and when dancing the war dance (cakalele)’, Galela *sumaraṇ* ‘sort of cutlass’, Pagu *sumaraṇ* ‘sword’, Tabaru *sumaraṇi* ‘sword’, Tobelo Boeng *humaraṇa* ‘sword’, Buli *sumaraṇ*, Sawai *sumaraṇ*, Gebe *samaran*, Patani *samara*, Gane *samaran* ‘sabre’, Biak *samara* ‘a kind of large machete’.<fnref n="6" />

Old Javanese *maṇḍapa* ‘open hall’ (< Sanskrit *maṇḍapa* ‘pavilion, temple’) > Ternate *mandapa* ‘grave border’.<fnref n="7" />

Old Javanese sima ~ sīma ‘freehold, piece of ground (sawah, village, etc) freed from taxes and other obligations’ (< Sanskrit sīman ‘boundary, border’) > Galela sima ‘reciprocal gift, reciprocal payment, that which one presents in recognition of an earlier gift or payment’, Buli sima ‘counter gift for the dowry consisting of: silver bracelets (rings) worth 5 guilders a pair and two plates’.

<footnote n="6">⁶ Hoogervorst (2023:47) claims that Biak *samara* ‘a kind of large machete’ is a loan of Malay *cəmara* ‘ornamental tuft’ < Sanskrit, Middle Indo-Aryan *cāmara* ‘a fly-whisk; a plume on the heads of horses’. Note that there is also Old Javanese *cāmara* ‘a chowrie, fly-whisk (made from the bushy tail of the yak), a fan (as an emblem of royalty); plume, tuft (on shields)’. However, the Biak form clearly has Ternate as its most immediate loan source. The etymology of *cāmara* is also problematic because Malay/Javanese *c* is never known to be adapted as *s* in Ternate and surrounding Moluccan languages. For example, Old Javanese *ruci* ‘subtle or crafty behavior, cleverness’ is borrowed as Ternate *ruci* ‘cheat’. The basis for the semantic shift in Hoogervorst’s etymology is not entirely clear. The alternative etymology presented here provides a much better phonological and a more obvious semantic match given the kinds of semantic adaptations we observe in (5).</footnote>

<footnote n="7">⁷ Voorhoeve and van Fraassen (nd) give the very specific definition of Ternate *mandapa* as ‘low wooden or cemented wall around a grave marking its location, it also prevents the pieces of pandanus leaf strewn on the grave by visitors from being blown away by the wind.’</footnote>
In the first two cases, it is necessary to posit a semantic shift whereby an abstract term in Old Javanese came to have a concrete referent in its loaned form. This pattern can in fact frequently be observed with loans from Sanskrit into Malay and Javanese (see examples given in (9) in section 3.2) and so can, relatively unproblematically, be subsumed under a broader pattern of semantic adaptation of loans in the region. In the last two cases, the basis for the semantic specialization from the posited Old Javanese forms cannot be understood simply on the basis of existing dictionary definitions. It seems very likely that the Old Javanese forms had meanings not described in existing linguistic works and that in the future improved lexicography could shed light on the motivations for such semantic shifts. For example, the Old Javanese inscriptional material described by Wisseman Christie (1998:222–223) clarifies that *sīma* also referred to a particular form of religious benefice and trade taxation in which transfers were made in elaborate ceremonies. Against this historical background, the semantic relationship of Old Javanese *sīma* ~ *sīma* to the Moluccan forms might be regarded as much less problematic. Without such historically informed connections, caution should be exercised in loan etymologizing.

Ternate also has a range of words whose shape indicates they are non-native and that look to be morphologically complex words built with Javanese forms, but are not known from the existing Javanese materials. For example, Ternate *panjara*, *panjaran* 'be astride' looks like a Javanese de-nominal verbalization **paN-jaran** 'VBLZ-horse', but no such form is attested in Javanese. Similarly, we might speculate that Ternate *tatabuan* 'set of gongs/cymbals'—a lexeme loaned widely in the Moluccas—comes from Old Javanese *tatā* 'arrangement' plus *bwaŋ* 'throw, hit', but this compound is also not evidenced in any Old Javanese materials. These forms could be taken to indicate that the Ternate coined new terms using (Old) Javanese roots during the period in which Javanese contact and influence in the Moluccas were significant. In support of such a scenario are the novel royal styles, *kaicili* and *jaicili*, which have been built with Javanese formatives, and the novel derivation of Old Javanese *seba* 'serve' which are found in Ternate (given in 4). Alternatively, these words were present in a pre-modern form of (Old) Javanese and simply have not been preserved in the written materials. As such, while these etymologies are tantalizing, they remain speculative.

**3.2 Javanese-specific characteristics in loans and problems in differentiating loan sources**

Loanwords with characteristics typical of Javanese also provide specific evidence for Javanese as a source of loans in the languages of the Moluccas. Identifying such characteristics is particularly important for distinguishing loanwords originating in Javanese from those originating in Malay. In many cases, however, there are little or no features on the basis of which to definitively posit a loan pathway, and both Javanese and Malay must be admitted as plausible sources.

In terms of phonology,<fnref n="8" /> most distinctive is the appearance of *w* as is typical of Javanese, rather than the *b* that is found in the corresponding Malay items, in a number of loanwords in the Moluccas (6). It is important to note that the appearance of *w* here cannot be accounted for by means of sound changes within specific recipient languages of the North Halmahera group. Both Ternate and Tidore, the two languages of the Moluccas most likely to represent the immediate borrowers from Javanese, retain *b* as such in inherited vocabulary (for example, Proto-Core North Halmahera *bikin* 'tail' (Zielenbach ongoing) > Ternate *biki*, Tidore *bii*, Loloda *bikini*, Modole *biʔini*, Kao *bikiŋ*, Tabaru *bikini*, Tobelo *bikini*, Sahu *bini*, Gamkonora *biʔiŋ*).

(6) Javanese loanwords signaled by *w* in the Moluccas

Javanese *wariŋin* 'banyan tree' (cf. Malay *bəriŋin*) > Ternate *wariŋi* ~ *wariŋ*, Tidore *wariŋ*, Galela *wariŋi*, Tobelo *warigi*, Gamkonora *wariŋ* 'banyan tree'.

Old Javanese *waliraŋ*, Javanese *wəliraŋ* 'sulphur' (cf. Malay *bəleraŋ*) > Ternate *waliraŋ* ~ *walira*, Tidore *weliraŋ* ~ *walira*, Galela *walira*, Loloda *walira*, Buli *walira*, Maba *walira*, Patani *walira*, Sawai *walira*, Taliabu *waliraŋ*, Sula *weliraŋ*, Asilulu *waliraŋ*, Sou Amana Teru *waliran*, Geser *waliran* 'sulphur'.

Javanese *waraŋan* 'arsenic, poisoned with arsenic' (cf. Malay *baraŋan* ~ *bəraŋan*) > Tobelo *waraŋa* 'a kind of red stone, soluble in water, with which the orang Tugutil supposedly poison their weapons, poison, to poison weapons [with this material]', Tobelo Boeng *waraŋana* 'a yellow root

<footnote n="8">⁸ There are relatively few sound changes from Proto-Malayo Polynesian (PMP) that separate Malay and Javanese, see Nothofer (1973:202-204) for an overview. Two differences are discussed in this article, specifically relating to PMP *b* and *R*, as these were the only ones relevant for the loanwords we identified.</footnote>
used as poison', Galela *waraṇa*, Sahu *waraṇa*, Buli *waraṇa*, Sawai *waraṇa* 'arsenic', Asilulu *waraṇan* 'venom (of animals)'.

Javanese *waja* 'steel, iron' (from Sanskrit *vāja* 'strength'; cf. Malay *baja*) > Ternate *waja* 'steel', Tidore *waja*, Galela *waja*, Tabaru *waja*, Tobelo *waja*, Gamkonora *waja*, Sahu *waja*, West Makian *waja*, East Makian *waja*, Gane *waja*, Asilulu *waja* 'iron'.

Old Javanese *wijyan* 'sesame-seed' (from root *wiji* 'seed, kernel'; cf. Modern Javanese *wijen*) > Ternate *wiji* 'sesame'.

Another key sound change which can be used to distinguish Javanese from Malay loans is that affecting PMP *R: in Malay PMP *R is regularly reflected as *r*, while in Javanese *R is regularly lost. For example, PMP *taRum* ‘indigo plant and dye’ is reflected as *tarum* in Malay, but *tom* in (Old) Javanese (with monophthongization of the **au sequence resulting from the loss of *R*). Thus, Ternate *tom* ‘indigo’ must be a loan from Javanese and not from Malay.

In many cases, loans in the Moluccas involve multiple historical layers of loaning which need careful analysis to disentangle Javanese from Malay. This is seen perhaps most pointedly with loan doublets in the languages of Halmahera in which it is apparent that a Javanese loan, or perhaps in some cases an older Malay form, exists alongside a related lexeme loaned from a more modern Malay form. For example, Moluccan loans of PMP *paN-tawaR (7) are divided into those without a *r* which have come via Javanese where *R > Ø, and those with an *r* ultimately from Malay where *R > *r*.<fnref n="9" /> The differences here cannot be explained with respect to internal sounds changes; Ternate and Galela languages are expected to lose final liquids, while Tobelo and Loloda retain them. Similar loan doublets also exist in the Moluccas for words that ultimately originate in Sanskrit, as seen with the loans of Sanskrit *vidyādharī* ‘fairy, sprite’ (8). Those with initial *w* come via Javanese, while those with initial *b* come via Malay.

(7) Loans of reflexes of PMP *paN-tawaR*

Javanese *panawa* ‘antidote’ > Tobelo *panawa* ‘medicine, balsam, amulet, magic medicine’, Loloda *panawa* ‘talisman, amulet’, Galela *panawa* ‘amulet magic ribbon hung around the neck’.

Malay *panawar* ‘antidote’ (> Javanese *panawar*) > Ternate *panawar* ‘somebody who makes you feel at ease, happy, something which makes you feel at ease, happy’, Galela *panawari* ‘talisman’.

(8) Loans of Sanskrit *vidyādharī* ‘fairy, sprite’

Javanese *widadari* ‘nymph, heavenly maiden’ > Galela *widadari* ‘nymph’, Modole *widadari* ‘nymph’, Pagu *widadari* ‘type of guardian spirit, such as *jin*’.

Malay *bidadari* ‘nymph, heavenly maiden’ > Ternate *bidadari* ‘fairy, daughter of heaven’, Tidore *bidadari* ‘female angel’, Sahu *bidadari* ‘angel’, Tabaru *bidadari* ‘magic creature, demon’, Patani *bidadari* ‘spirit’, Sawai *bidadari* ‘fairy, elf’, Taliabu *bidadari* ‘upper-world, things from the upper-world, nymphs’.

Unexpected differences in stress on loans in the Moluccas are also suggestive of different loan pathways and timings. For example, consider the loans ultimately originating in Sanskrit *utpatti* given in (9). The loans with irregular final stress and a centralized pretonic vowel indicate a loan form with a schwa, such as found in more modern forms of Malay and Javanese; forms in the Moluccas with regular penultimate stress on the *a* vowel point to an earlier loan, such as from Old Javanese *utpatti*. The absence of a detailed Old Malay lexicon means that it is impossible to exclude it as a possible source for the forms with a penultimate *a* vowel. Adelaar (1994) points out that older Malay forms, like those attested in inscriptions, often maintained word forms closer to the original Indic forms than later forms of Malay. As such, the only conclusion which can be made is that there are different loan layers, reflecting borrowing from older and more modern forms of either Javanese or Malay, respectively.

<footnote n="9">⁹ In Modern Javanese, *panawar* is found alongside *panawa*, but the former is a borrowing from Malay.</footnote>
(9) Loans of Sanskrit *utpatti* 'profit, productiveness'

Old Javanese *utpatti* ~ *utpati* > Ternate *upáti* 'tribute', Galela *upáti* 'rates, capitation, poll-tax'.

Malay (or Javanese) *upəti* [upə'ti] > Tidore *upəti?* 'tribute', Tobelo *upəti* 'taxation', Loloda *upati* 'tax'.<fnref n="10" />

In general, Sanskrit loans found in both Javanese and Malay can rarely have their immediate source traced definitively to one or the other when loaned further into the Moluccan languages. Examples are given in (10). Old Javanese in these cases provides a consistently better formal match for the Moluccan forms, especially with reference to vowels, than either Modern Malay or Modern Javanese. This places the contact which occasioned the borrowing in the pre-modern period, but does not clarify whether Old Javanese or Old Malay was the immediate source for borrowing. By the same token, the historical data makes clear that it was Java which was the major hub for spices in the pre-modern period. So, while borrowing from Old Malay cannot be ruled out absolutely in these cases, Old Javanese represents a more probable source from a historical perspective.

(10) Loan words from Sanskrit found in both Javanese and Malay, and their forms in the Moluccas

Sanskrit *pārada* 'quicksilver' > Old Javanese *parada* 'gold-leaf', Javanese *prada*, Malay *pərada* > Ternate *parada* 'kind of thick glossy paper formerly used to make paper flowers (soaked in vinegar it is used as a dressing for wounds), gold-coloured paper used as wrapping for toffees'.

Sanskrit *paramatā* 'excellence' > Old Javanese *paramata* ~ *pramata* 'gem, jewel', Malay *pərmata* 'gem, jewel' > Tobelo *paramata* 'precious stones', Galela *paramata* 'precious stone', Buli *paramata* 'gemstones'.

Sanskrit *tulasī* 'holy basil' > Old Javanese *sulasih* ~ *tulasih*, Javanese *slasih* ~ *tlasih* 'holy basil', Malay *səlasih* > Ternate *sulasi*, Sahu *sulasi*, Tobelo *sulasi* ~ *hulahi* 'holy basil'.

Sanskrit *komala* 'gracious, charming' > Old Javanese *komala* 'a kind of precious stone', Malay *kumala* ~ *komala* ~ *kəmala* ~ *gəmala* 'jade, gemstone' > Ternate *komalo* 'bezoar stone'.

Sanskrit *muttika* > Old Javanese *muṣṭika* ~ *mustika* 'pearl, jewel, the most excellent', Malay *məstika* 'bezoar, talismanic stone' > Galela *musitika* 'bezoar stone', Tabaru *musutika* 'pearl', Tobelo *muhutika* 'pearl, bezoar stone', Buli *mustika* 'pearl', Gebe *mustika* 'pearl'.

Sanskrit *saindhava* 'rock salt' > Old Javanese *sendhawa* 'a kind of rock-salt, any salt', Javanese *səndawa* 'saltpeter, potassium nitrate, gunpowder', Malay *səndawa* 'saltpeter' > Ternate *sindawa* 'alum', Tidore *sindawa*, Gamkonora *sindawa*, Sahu *sindao*, West Makian *sindawa*, East Makian *sindawa*, Gane *sindawa*.

Similarly problematic for the differentiation between a Javanese and Malay source are the many loans from Javanese into Malay. Multiple lexemes of this type are found in the Moluccas with particular concentrations in North Halmahera languages such as Ternate and Tidore. Some examples are given in (11). In each of these cases, there are no phonological hallmarks by which the immediate loan source can be determined to be Javanese or Malay.

(11) Javanese lexemes loaned into Malay and languages in Halmahera

Old Javanese *kucubuŋ* ~ *kacubuŋ* 'thorn-apple, *Datura* sp', Javanese *kacubuŋ* ~ *kəcubuŋ* 'datura, a variety of poisonous plant with large trumpet-shaped flowers' > Malay *kəcubuŋ*; Ternate *kucubu* 'Datura alba', Tobelo *kocubu* 'Datura sp'.

Old Javanese *catu* 'portion, part, share; a measure', *acatu* 'to get one's share' > Malay *catu* 'portion, ration, allocation, share, supply'; Ternate *catu* 'give by a person of higher rank to someone of lower rank, esp. king to subjects', Tidore *catu* 'give', Tabaru *catu* 'give a gift, from a greater person to a lesser person'.

<footnote n="10">¹⁰ The original transcriptions of the Halmahera forms follow older, standard orthographic practices using {ě} which we re-transcribe as a schwa here, following IPA conventions (see van Baarda (1895) and van Baarda (1904)). Hueting (1936:297) notes for Tobelo, however, that ‘... een pepet komt niet voor, al heb ik dat vroeger ook gemeend, het is overal een zwakke e klank’. The Halmaheran languages do not have phonemic schwas and the reduction of the /e/ vowel noted by Hueting would seem to be the result of its pretonic position in these words.</footnote>
Old Javanese *geger* ‘tumultuous confusion’, Javanese *geger* ‘turbulence, tumult, chaos’ > Malay *geger*
‘noise, uproar, bustle, commotion, tumult, panic, turbulence; in chaos, panicked’; Ternate *geger*
‘rowdy, loud noise’.

When considering such loans individually, it would be easy to account for them as transmitted via Malay, as scholars have tended to do up until now. However, when we consider the wider patterns of borrowing charted in this article, direct borrowing from Javanese seems, on the balance of probabilities, more likely. That is, while no formal evidence disambiguates the immediate source of borrowing, the fact that numerous other loans direct from (Old) Javanese cluster in the domains of courtly language and important biota suggests that the loans in (10) and (11) may also not have been mediated by Malay.

In short, the complexities of linguistic history in the Moluccas mean that in many cases the immediate
source of loans cannot always be determined with absolute confidence on formal grounds. Often, however, the
patterns of borrowing and their historical background mean that (Old) Javanese can frequently be regarded as
a more probable immediate source than Malay.

3.3 Loan replacement and fringe distributions of Javanese loans in the Moluccas

As a center in the global spice trade for many centuries, the Moluccas have had contact with groups speaking a plethora of languages. The different influences which have lapped at the shores of the Moluccas have left their mark behind in the form of loanwords. Over time, new influences have brought new loanwords, displacing those from earlier established contacts. But replacement is not always complete, older loans can be observed to be preserved at the fringes of the Moluccan lexical spread zone centered on Ternate and Tidore.

Borrowing from Javanese at an early time followed by borrowing from Malay can be used to explain some of the fringe distributions that exist for various Old Javanese loans beyond the Moluccas. For example, most languages in the Moluccas around Halmahera have words for ‘copper’ and/or ‘bronze’ which, as throughout much of Indonesia, reflect *tambaga (Kern 1869:10; Blust 1992). However, beyond Halmahera, we also find loans of Old Javanese *riti* < Sanskrit *rīti* ‘brass, bell-metal’ and Old Javanese *gaṇsa* ~ *kaṇsa* ‘vessel made of metal; white copper, bell-metal’ < Sanskrit *kaṁsa* ‘a vessel made of metal; copper, brass, bell-metal’. These are sporadically preserved in the Moluccas, typically in languages on the edges of the region (Map 3). Loans of *riti* are primarily preserved in the southern part of the lexical diffusion zone emanating from Halmahera, and are often semantically specialized to refer to a kind of bronze or copper body ornament, rather than the metal in general. Loans of *gaṇsa* ~ *kaṇsa* are only present in the east, and have been primarily dispersed by Biak in Cenderawasih Bay. The preservation of the form with initial *g* in Moi, however, makes clear that that language did not acquire its form from Biak (see Schapper and van Schie forthcoming for more on the diagnostic significance of *g* in the region’s loanwords).

Words for money that ultimately reflect (Old) Javanese *picis* ‘k.o. cash coin, money’ illustrate the way
Ternate and Halmahera have been at the center of innovation and spread for loanwords in the wider region.
Consider the two color-coded sets for ‘money’ and their relative distributions in Map 4. The forms in blue are
presumed to reflect early spread of (Old) Javanese *picis* from Halmahera, with adaptations of the original
medial *c* as *s* in Ambon and *t* in the central Bird’s Head, Bomberai and the Kei-Seram Laut region. Particularly
important for this scenario is the appearance of *picis* in Manado Malay. From at least the 16th century, Manado
and northern Sulawesi were under the control of the sultan of Ternate and the region was host to a large
Moluccan population (Henley 1993). Manado Malay has a very large number of words originating in Ternate
(Brickell 2020:159, Paauw 2008:12), far beyond that found in other Malay varieties in the region. This may
be taken to indicate that the settlement was, at least in part, founded by speakers of Ternate, and that *picis* in
Manado Malay preserves an earlier Ternate form. The forms in green represent a later innovation in Halmahera
in which *picis* became **pipis*.<fnref n="11" /> Descendents of **pipis then spread, leaving earlier forms reflecting Javanese
*picis* in pockets and at the fringes of the regions of North Moluccan influence. The modern form *pipi* is due to
the regular loss of final syllables in Ternate; Sahu and West Makian as well as several Austronesian languages

<footnote n="11">¹¹ There are two sound change scenarios by which **pipis might have come about: (i) irregular assimilation of medial *c* to the initial *p*, and; (ii) **pipis may have arisen through a partial reduplication of original *picis*, i.e., **pi~picis**, followed by deletion of the final syllable, resulting in **pi~pic**, and then an irregular change to **pi~pis**. Whilst such reduplications and final syllable deletions are common in Ternate and other North Halmahera languages, this account assumes a sound change of *c* > *s* in Ternate, which is otherwise not attested (see fn. 6)</footnote>
of South Halmahera preserve *pipis*. The latter-day Ternate form *pipi* has been widely borrowed in Halmahera, Raja Ampat and Cenderawasih Bay. Outside of Halmahera, only Inanwatan and Irarutu have borrowed a form with the final s intact.

<figure><img src="image_4.png" /><figcaption>**Map 4:** Distribution of loans of (Old) Javanese *picis* ‘k.o. coin, money’ in eastern Indonesia: forms reflecting early spread in blue, forms reflecting later innovative *x*pipis in green</figcaption></figure>

<figure><img src="image_5.png" /></figure>
Such cases illustrate how early loans from (Old) Javanese may no longer be present in the places where contact would have been most concentrated or in their original borrowed forms. Innovations and new waves of contact and lexical borrowing, most obviously from Malay, mean that a full understanding of Javanese influence can only be obtained by charting loan patterns across the whole of the eastern Indonesian area where lexical influence from Halmahera is known.

## 4 Javanese influence beyond loanwords: Speech levels

Influence from Java is not limited to loanwords, but can also be found in the appearance of speech levels in some languages of the Moluccas. Speech levels are systems of politeness distinctions in which the choice of word from a specific level connotes differences in the relative status of the addressee with respect to the speaker (see Gonda 1949, Uhlenbeck 1950, *inter alia*). Speech level systems are common in the languages of Java as well as the neighboring languages of Bali and Lombok. They arose initially in Javanese in the time of Mataram empire (8–10th centuries) and spread through influence from that language (see, e.g., Clynes 1989, 1994; Nothofer 2000). The number of meanings that have different word forms for the different speech levels differs widely. The use of speech levels within Java can in broad terms be connected to the distance a group is from the royal courts in Yogyakarta and Solo; the further away from these centres a linguistic group is, the less it is that its speakers tend to know or use speech levels (Vander Klok 2024:474).

In the Moluccas, speech levels occur in the languages where Javanese influence was strongest, that is, on the islands to the west of Halmahera where the powerful clove sultanates were located. And the use of polite speech forms is noted to be intimately connected to the language used at the courts of the sultans (Bert Voorhoeve pers. comm. 2016, van Staden 2000:92). The most notable form of speech levels are innovative polite pronouns in Ternate and Tidore (see Hayami-Allen (2001:44–45) and van Staden (2000:91–93) for discussion of the etymologies of the polite pronouns). These are listed in Table 1 alongside the inherited pronouns for common use. The polite forms of the pronouns are occasionally borrowed further into other North Halmahera languages, e.g., *faŋare* ‘1SG.M’ also appears as a polite pronominal form in Gamkonora and Tabaru.

<table><caption>**Table 1:** Speech levels in pronouns of Ternate and Table</caption><thead><tr><th rowspan="2"></th><th colspan="2">Ternate</th><th colspan="2">Tidore</th></tr><tr><th>COMMON</th><th>POLITE</th><th>COMMON</th><th>POLITE</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>1SG.F</td><td>ŋori, ŋoto</td><td>fajaru</td><td>ŋori, ŋoto</td><td>fajaru, fajato</td></tr><tr><td>1SG.M</td><td>ŋana</td><td>faŋare</td><td>ŋona, ŋan</td><td>faŋare, faŋato</td></tr><tr><td>2SG</td><td>mina</td><td>ŋon</td><td>mina</td><td>jou</td></tr><tr><td>3SG.F</td><td>una</td><td></td><td>una</td><td>jou</td></tr><tr><td>3SG.M</td><td></td><td></td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>1PL.EXCL.F</td><td>ŋom(i)</td><td>fajaru ŋom</td><td>ŋom</td><td>jo(u)ŋom, faraŋom</td></tr><tr><td>1PL.EXCL.M</td><td></td><td>faŋare ŋom</td><td></td><td></td></tr><tr><td>1PL.INCL</td><td>ŋone</td><td></td><td>ŋone</td><td>jo(u)ŋone, faraŋon</td></tr><tr><td>2PL</td><td>ŋon(i)</td><td></td><td>ŋon</td><td>jo(u)ŋon</td></tr><tr><td>3PL.HUM</td><td>ana</td><td></td><td>ona</td><td></td></tr><tr><td>3.NHUM</td><td>ena</td><td></td><td>ena</td><td></td></tr></tbody></table>

Beyond pronouns, there are several meanings in Ternate and Tidore for which speech levels are known. The documentation of the levels is very limited, likely because they seemed to have been chiefly used when communicating with high court dignitaries and the Sultan himself, but the courts had been defunct for several decades before their reestablishment in the 1990s. For example, the common forms of the verb ‘eat’ in Ternate and Tidore are *oho* and *oyo* respectively reflecting Proto-Core North Halmahera *oTom* ‘eat’ (Zielenbach ongoing), while the polite forms are Ternate *balesa* and Tidore *talesa*—both derived from the noun *lesa* ‘plate’ by means of different Malay derivational prefixes. Of the Ternate form, Voorhoeve and van Fraassen (nd) observe that it was an honorific term used for the eating of the Sultan.

Nearby on Makian Island, an important centre of premodern clove cultivation, speech levels seem to have been better preserved, perhaps because their use was not connected to a royal court. Both the Papuan language of the island’s western side and the Austronesian language of its eastern side are known to have distinct speech level forms for multiple basic vocabulary items (see Tables 2 and 3 respectively). Voorhoeve (pers. comm. 2016) suggests that the feature of speech levels spread from Ternate and Tidore to Makian. This scenario is
supported by the fact that multiple polite forms can be identified as borrowings from these languages, e.g., West Makian Sabale kadu 'sleep' < Ternate kadu 'sleepy, asleep', West Makian Bobawa jajow 'hold' < Tidore jau 'hold', and; East Makian jou 'yes' < Ternate jou ~ joo 'yes', Tidore joo 'yes (polite)', East Makian palihara 'bury' < Ternate palihara ~ palhara 'look after, bury' (ultimately from Malay pelihara), East Makian pasiar 'walk' < Ternate pasiar 'walk, stroll' (ultimately from Portuguese passear).

<table><caption>**Table 2:** Speech levels in West Makian dialects (after Voorhoeve 1982:5)</caption><thead><tr><th rowspan="2"></th><th colspan="2">Bobawa</th><th colspan="2">Sabale</th></tr><tr><th>COMMON</th><th>POLITE</th><th>COMMON</th><th>POLITE</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>'arm'</td><td>kamma</td><td>jowjow</td><td>ia</td><td>jowjow</td></tr><tr><td>'eye'</td><td>afe</td><td>sado</td><td>afe</td><td>sado</td></tr><tr><td>'head'</td><td>apota</td><td>tabia</td><td>apota</td><td>tabea</td></tr><tr><td>'leg'</td><td>gow</td><td>tarotaro</td><td>gufi</td><td>tarotaro</td></tr><tr><td>'tooth'</td><td>wi</td><td>fakar</td><td>wi</td><td></td></tr><tr><td>'mouth'</td><td>mada</td><td></td><td>mada</td><td>pasul</td></tr><tr><td>'eat'</td><td>fiam</td><td>fajow</td><td>fa</td><td>fajow</td></tr><tr><td>'drink'</td><td>bebe</td><td></td><td>bebe</td><td>jowbe</td></tr><tr><td>'sleep'</td><td>tifi</td><td></td><td>tifi</td><td>kadu</td></tr><tr><td>'hold'</td><td>maa</td><td>jajow</td><td></td><td></td></tr></tbody></table>

<table><caption>**Table 3:** Speech levels in East Makian (after Bowden 2001:22)</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>COMMON</th><th>POLITE</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>'yes'</td><td>ole</td><td>jou</td></tr><tr><td>'hungry'</td><td>hamolam</td><td>maledi</td></tr><tr><td>'chat'</td><td>hacarita</td><td>matutin</td></tr><tr><td>'bury'</td><td>toanam</td><td>palihara</td></tr><tr><td>'walk'</td><td>taggil</td><td>pasiar</td></tr><tr><td>'eat'</td><td>ahon, hatuto</td><td>haloin</td></tr></tbody></table>

Elsewhere in Halmahera, loans from Ternate seem to be the main source of polite forms. For example, speakers of Gamkonora noted to the first author that Ternate functions as the “polite language” amongst them (Schapper 2021).

Although these Moluccan systems of speech levels are minimal when compared to those in Java, they are striking for their mere appearance. The feature is completely absent from other Papuan language-cultural systems which are notoriously egalitarian and is lacking elsewhere in Island Southeast Asia outside of the Javanosphere (Blust 2009:118–123). This speaks strongly to speech levels in the Moluccas being the result of members of the elite in Ternate and Tidore seeking to mimic aspects of the Javanese speech levels in their speech.

## 5 Conclusion

Loanwords convey information about linguistic interactions, and can reveal population contacts which took place in the past. The idea that loanwords disperse along established vectors of contact is hardly new, but in the case of the Moluccas, loanwords have not been carefully studied for what they can reveal about past contacts. A prevailing assumption that loanwords, whatever their ultimate source, must have come by way of Malay has meant that the evidence of other contacts in the Moluccas has been largely overlooked. As a destination for traders for many centuries, if not a millennium, multiple waves of linguistic influence have lapped over the shores of the Moluccas. Historical records make clear that Javanese and Moluccans had ongoing contact through the clove trade up until the middle of the seventeenth century. According to the author of the *Treatise on the Moluccas* Javanese titles were commonly used and identified as such in the first half of the sixteenth century. At the same time, the author observes that Malay was only just coming “into vogue” at the time of writing (Jacobs 1971:75). All this points to a role for Javanese as a source for borrowing in the Moluccas prior to Malay.
This article has definitively refuted the idea that, if Javanese loanwords are found in the Moluccas, they must have spread via Malay. We have shown that there is ample evidence among the languages of the Moluccas for lexical borrowing from Javanese and, particularly, Old Javanese. This finding is not surprising considering the historical spice routes to which the Moluccas were connected, but underlines the importance of approaching loanwords in a historically informed way. Among the lexical material presented here were numerous loanwords in the Moluccas which can only be from Javanese, because no Malay form is known. In many cases, loans were shown to be specifically from Old Javanese. In other cases, Old Javanese provided a better match to the Moluccan loans than either Modern Javanese or Malay, but borrowing from Old Malay could not be excluded definitively, although the closer identity with pre-modern forms puts the contact which led to the borrowing in an earlier period when the Javanese, rather than the Malays, played the dominant role in the spice trade of the Moluccas. Over time, as Javanese influence receded, new loan words were adopted into the languages of the Moluccas from other languages such as Malay, resulting in layers of loanwords. On the one hand, this layering is reflected in etymological doublets of Javanese and Malay loans in some languages in the Moluccas. On the other hand, spread patterns emerged whereby older Javanese loans are only attested at the fringes of the Moluccas, having been replaced elsewhere by novel forms or through subsequent borrowing from languages like Malay.

The focus of this article has been on Javanese language influence exerted in the original Moluccas (but in today's terminology the North Moluccas). Our contention has been that the powerful clove trading sultanates of Ternate and Tidore, and their languages, played a central role in the adoption of Javanese language forms; it was chiefly through them that Javanese influence circulated in the Moluccas. Yet, Ternate and Tidore were by no means the only conduit for Javanese linguistic influence in eastern Indonesia in the premodern period. The Javanese are also known to have been pivotal in the nutmeg trade out of the Banda Islands and the sandalwood trade in Timor. These contacts led to distinct loan events. For example, forms reflecting *turika 'knife, metal-bladed instrument' are the result of multiple borrowings of Old Javanese *curiga 'kris' (< Sanskrit *churikā 'knife'), as discussed by Schapper (2024). The words were dispersed along with the metal instruments through local trade networks and came to extend over a wide area from Ambon and Timor to southern New Guinea and the Torres Strait (Swadling 1996:156–157). Crucially, there is no evidence that these forms were ever present in the North Moluccas, nor that the networks of the sultanates of Ternate or Tidore were involved in their dispersal. Further work is needed to uncover the full extent of pre-modern Javanese influence in eastern Indonesia; this article represents a first effort to give Javanese its proper place in our understanding of the region's linguistic history.

## Sources and their transcriptions

Among the sources we use for the languages of eastern Indonesia are a wide variety of orthographic and phonetic transcription practices dating from different periods. To minimize confusion arising from these different practices, we present lexemes following a unified system. The Dutch spellings <oe>, <tj>, and <dj> have been replaced by <u>, <c>, and <j>, respectively. The glottal stop is spelled <?>, the velar nasal <ŋ> and the palatal nasal <ŋ>. Retroflexes have been rendered with their IPA forms, rather than with a subscript point as is common in the Indic tradition, e.g., <ḍ> in place of <ḍ>. Schwa is represented by <ə>. Diacritics which do not indicate phonemic distinctions have been eliminated. Stress is marked with an acute accent where necessary.

## Language sources

All lexical sources for the Moluccas used in this article were accessed through the OUTOFPAPUA database (Kamholz et al. 2025). Maps of lexical dispersals were also generated using this database.

<table><tr><td>Alune</td><td>Niggemeyer (1951)</td></tr><tr><td>Ambel</td><td>Arnold (2019)</td></tr><tr><td>Ansus</td><td>Price and Donohue (2009)</td></tr><tr><td>Asilulu</td><td>Collins (2003b)</td></tr><tr><td>Biak</td><td>van den Heuvel (2019)</td></tr><tr><td>Buli</td><td>Maan (1940)</td></tr><tr><td>East Makian</td><td>Bowden (2001), van der Crab (1862)</td></tr></table>
<table>
   <tr>
    <td>Galela</td>
    <td>van Baarda (1895), Wattimury, Tetelepta and Kakerissa (1992)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Gamkonora</td>
    <td>Imelda and Bowden (2014), van der Crab (1862)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Gane</td>
    <td>Stokhof (1980), van der Crab (1862)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Gebe</td>
    <td>Bax (2019)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Geser</td>
    <td>Stokhof (1980)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Javanese</td>
    <td>Robson and Wibisone (2002)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Kao</td>
    <td>Budiman (2012)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Kurudu</td>
    <td>van der Heuvel (2023)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Larike</td>
    <td>Laidig and Laidig (1991)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Loloda</td>
    <td>Stokhof (1980), van Baarda (1904)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Maba</td>
    <td>Stokhof (1980)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Modole</td>
    <td>Stokhof (1980)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Moi</td>
    <td>Stokhof and Flassy (1985)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Moor</td>
    <td>Kamholz (2013)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Muna</td>
    <td>van den Berg (2018)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Old Javanese</td>
    <td>Zoetmulder (1982)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Pagu</td>
    <td>Stokhof (1980), Peranginangin (2014), G.J. Ellen (1916)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Patani</td>
    <td>Stokhof (1980)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Tabaru</td>
    <td>Kotynski (nd)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Taliabu</td>
    <td>Fortgens (1921)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Ternate</td>
    <td>Voorhoeve and van Fraassen (nd), Hayami-Allen (2001), van der Crab (1862)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Tidore</td>
    <td>Stokhof (1980), van Staden (2000), Pikkert and Pikkert (1994), van der Crab (1862)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Tobelo</td>
    <td>Clark (2022), Taylor (nd), Rugebregt et al. (1986)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Sahu</td>
    <td>Visser and Voorhoeve (1987), van der Crab (1862)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Sula</td>
    <td>Bloyd (2020)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Sawai</td>
    <td>Whisler (2019), Stokhof (1980)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Serui-Laut</td>
    <td>Slump (1924-1938)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Sou Amana Teru</td>
    <td>Musgrave (nd)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Sougb</td>
    <td>Lunow (nd)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>South Nuaulu</td>
    <td>Bolton and Matoke (2005)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Tandia</td>
    <td>Kijne (nd a)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Wamesa Windesi</td>
    <td>Gasser (2019)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Wamesa Wandamen</td>
    <td>Henning and Henning (1991), Kijne (nd b)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>West Makian</td>
    <td>Collins (1982), Peranginangin (2020), van der Crab (1862)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Wolio</td>
    <td>Anceaux (1987)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Wooi</td>
    <td>Sawaki (nd)</td>
   </tr>
   <tr>
    <td>Yawa</td>
    <td>Jones, Paai and Paai (1989)</td>
   </tr>
  </table>

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