Reconstructions

Note

Based on the comparison Javanese waŋkaŋ ‘ship’, Ngaju Dayak waŋkaŋ ‘Chinese junk’, Fijian waŋga ‘canoe’, Tongan, Futunan vaka, Samoan vaʔa ‘canoe’ Dempwolff (1934-38) reconstructed *waŋkaŋ ‘water vehicle, ship, canoe’. This long accepted etymology actually is highly problematic.

First, reflexes with a final nasal are known in only five languages, and in each case these refer specifically to Chinese junks: Ngaju Dayak waŋkaŋ ‘Chinese junk’, tanah waŋkaŋ ‘China’; Malay waŋkaŋ ‘Chinese ocean-going junk’, limau waŋkaŋ ‘imported Chinese oranges’; Acehnese, Javanese, Makassarese waŋkaŋ ‘Chinese junk (boat)’.

Second, neither the Malay nor the Javanese words can regularly reflect *waŋkaŋ, since *w- disappeared in Malay and *wa- became Javanese o.

Moreover, the word in Ngaju Dayak, which is spoken in the interior river systems of Southeast Borneo, clearly is a loan from the coastal Banjarese. It appears likely, then, that waŋkaŋ is a loan from some southern form of Chinese (Fukienese? Hakka?) which was borrowed into Malay and Javanese.

In apparent contradiction to this conclusion are reflexes in CMP, South Halmahera-West New Guinea, and especially OC languages, where the probability of early borrowing from Chinese is all but non-existent. Since most OC languages have lost original final consonants, many OC reflexes could derive from *waŋkaŋ. In those languages which normally preserve the final consonant, however, no final consonant is found in this word (Dobuan, Roviana), thus supporting *waŋka, not *waŋkaŋ. Doran (1981) has chosen this form as the title of a book on Austronesian canoe origins, but he combines a genuine Oceanic cognate set with such non-cognate WMP forms as Tagalog baŋkaʔ ‘boat’, Malagasy lakana (Prov. laka) ‘canoe’.

It is now simplest to conclude that *waŋka was an innovation which appeared in northeastern Indonesia prior to the separation of the CMP and EMP language groups from one another, but after the separation of PCEMP from all other Austronesian languages. Under this interpretation, the similarity of the native term *waŋka to the apparent loanword waŋkaŋ must be considered a remarkable coincidence. Under this interpretation, Mongondow waŋga (for expected **waŋka) ‘boat’ is best regarded as a loan from some still undetermined CMP source.