Monday, September 3, 2007

Why are the people of Netherlands called the Dutch?

People from Holland are called Dutch by English-speaking people only. This word is the English counterpart of the Dutch words ‘diets’ and ‘duits’. ‘Duits’ means German since the Germans call themselves ‘Deutsche’. Around 1290 in the northern and eastern part of the Netherlands, the word was ‘duutsc’ and as the Frisian people (living in the North) spoke a language much more like English. The English adapted Dutch from Frisian Duutsc. Later, ‘duutsc’ became the Dutch word for their eastern neighbours Duits (German).

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