The Sanskrit Loan-Words in the Cebuano-Bisayan Language

Abstract

In the definition of the cultures of Philippine ethnic groups and in the reconstruction of their history the ethnologist invariably encounters the problem of establishing pre-Hispanic cultural relationships between India and the Philippines, and the identification of Indian elements in Philippine cultures. The solution of the problem, although partly achieved, is still mainly hypothetical because of the existence of two impediments, namely; (a) the paucity of speaking sources such as archaeological findings and written records, and (b) the complex cultural overlays brought about by centuries of colonization. On account of the scarcity of speaking sources ethnologists have attempted to solve the aforementioned problem by investigating the presence of Indian, or more specifically. Sanskrit loan-words in Philippine languages with the guidance of linguists, if the ethnologists are not professionally trained linguists themselves. The studies undertaken by such scholars seem to be founded on the axioms that language is an index of culture and that cultural borrowing is generally conterminous with linguistic borrowing. Among the scholarly works undertaken along this line are Joaquin Pardo de Tavera's Sanscrito de la Lengua Tagala (Paris, 1887), H. Kern's Verspreide Geschriften (S' Gravenhage,