A history of the English Language

145.
Words from the Low Countries.
The importance of the Romance element in English has overshadowed and caused to be 
neglected another source of foreign words in the vocabulary, the languages of the Low 
Countries—Flemish, Dutch, and Low German. The similarity of these languages to 
English makes it difftcult often to tell whether a word has been adopted from one of them 
or is of native origin. Moreover, the influence was not the result of some single cause, 
like the introduction of Christianity or the Norman Conquest, confined more or less to a 
given period of time, but was rather a gradual infiltration due to the constant and close 
relations between England and the people of Flanders, Holland, and northern Germany. 
This intercourse extends from the days of William the Conqueror, whose wife was 
Flemish, down to the eighteenth century. All through the Middle Ages Flemings came to 
England in considerable numbers. In the English wars at home and abroad we repeatedly 
find Flemish mercenaries fighting with the English forces. Others came for more peaceful 
purposes and settled in the country. The wool industry was the major industry of England 
in the Middle Ages. Most of the wool exported from England went to supply Flemish and 
Dutch looms. On the other hand, weavers from the Low Countries, noted for their 
superior cloths, were encouraged to come to England and at various times came in large 
numbers. They were sufficiently numerous to arouse at intervals the antagonism of the 
A history of the english language 174

---

native population. In the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381 we are told that “many fflemmynges 
loste here heedes…and namely they that koude nat say Breede and Chese, But Case and 
Brode.”
35
Trade between these countries and England was responsible for much travel to 
and fro. Flemish and German merchants had their hanse at London, Boston, Lynn, and 
elsewhere. The English wool staple was at different times at Dordrecht, Louvain, Bruges, 
and other towns near the coast. Add to this the fact that the carrying trade was largely in 
the hands of the Dutch until the Navigation Act of 1651, and we see that there were many 
favorable conditions for the introduction of Low German words into English. At the end 
of the Middle Ages we find entering the language such words as 
nap
(of cloth), 
deck, 
bowsprit, lighter, dock, freight, rover, mart, groat, guilder
. Later borrowings include 
cambric, duck
(cloth), 
boom
(of a boat), 
beleaguer, furlough, commodore, gin, gherkin, 
dollar
. Dutch eminence in art is responsible for 
easel, etching, landscape,
while Dutch 
settlers in America seem to have caused the adoption of 
cruller, cookie, cranberry, 
bowery, boodle,
and other words. The latest study of the Low Dutch element in English 
considers some 2,500 words. Many of these are admittedly doubtful, but one must grant 
the possibility of more influence from the Low Countries upon English than can be 
proved by phonological or other direct evidence.
36