The
Dutch
Documents
Language 
Introduction
How could language constitute as a challenge when reading records created in the Netherlands and other Dutch native speaking countries? Most researchers might assume that fluency in speaking or reading Dutch would be enough to interpret records of genealogical value. However, as people start reading older records, they quickly find out that the records are not written in a pure standard form of Dutch, but in a variety of Dutch influenced by local dialects and other languages, particularly Latin, which was the main literary language used by Catholic priests and Dutch scholars such as the Humanist Erasmus. In the South, some documents were written in French.
The process of standardizing the Dutch language with rules regulating the spelling and grammar of Dutch began at the start of the 16th century. The only major language differences from records in standard Dutch are the effects of the six different dialects spoken within the 12 provinces.
Variant Forms of Words
As you read Dutch records, you will need to be aware that some words vary with usage. The prefix 't is equal to the Dutch word het, which means the. The prefix 's is a part of many place-names and means des (of the). All prefixes are disregarded in alphabetized lists, except in Flemish records. The endings of words in a document may differ from what you find in a word list. For example, the document may use the word jonger, but you will find it in a word list as jong. In addition, the suffixes -je, -tje,-tien, or -ke are often added to words to indicate "little." These suffixes can also indicate the feminine version of a name. Therefore, the word zoontje means "little" or "young (tje) son (zoon)." The ending -sdr means "daughter of. Maritje is Mary and Aanke is Anna.
Plural forms of Dutch words usually add -en or -s to the singular word. Thus boer (farmer) becomes boeren (farmers), and tafel (table or index) becomes tafels (tables or indexes).
In Dutch, many words are formed by joining two or more words together. Very few of these compound words are included in this list. You will need to look up each part of the word separately. For example, geboortedag is a combination of two words, geboorte (birth) and dag (day).
Alphabetical Order
In the Dutch language, the letter combination ij is considered a single letter. It has the same value as y, and it is usually alphabetized as if it were a y. Some Dutch dictionaries and indexes use the following alphabetical order:
a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, q, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, ij (or y), z
Some Dutch dictionaries alphabetize the letter ij under i then j.
This word list follows the standard English alphabetical order. However, when working with alphabetized Dutch records, use the Dutch alphabetical order.
Spelling
Spelling rules were not standardized in earlier centuries. Writers often failed to dot the ij, so that it looks like a y. The letter y was not used in older records. In Dutch, the following spelling variations are common.
y used for ij
g used for ch
d and t used interchangeably
j and i used interchangeably
Example: echt spelled as egt
overlijden spelled as overlyden
Arie spelled as Arij
Below is an example of the use of "i" and "y" in “Arys” and “Luitjen”
Dutch Around the World
Dutch is spoken in the Netherlands, northern Belgium, the Netherlands Antilles in the Caribbean, and Suriname. Flemish, which is spoken in Belgium, is a major dialect (regional variation) of Dutch. It uses words similar to the words in Dutch from the Netherlands. Afrikaans, which is spoken in South Africa, is a different language that is similar to Dutch. Frisian, which is spoken in the Dutch province of Friesland, is a different language from Dutch. In addition, Dutch is found in some early records of the United States (mostly in New York, New Jersey, Michigan, and Iowa) and in South Africa, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, and Taiwan. Because of the distance between each region, variations of the language occurred and occur still today.
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