THE SAKAI DIALECT OF THE ULU KAMPAB. 91 



The Sakai Dialect of the Ulu Kampar, 



Perak. 



By H. L. E. Luebing, Ph. D. (Strassburg). 



In 1891 Mr. Hugh Clifford published in No. 24 of this 

 Journal some very valuable notes on the Sakai dialects of the 

 Malay Peninsula, and three years later, in No. 27, Mr. C. Otto 

 Blagden. in an ingenious compilation, first proved the close 

 affinity of these and other tongues with the branches of the 

 large family of Indo-chinese languages, especially with the Mon 

 (Pegu) and the Khmer (Cambodja). Till the year 1894 the 

 linguistic position of these people was absolutely unknown. 

 Mr. Vaughan Stephens believed to have found in these languages 

 similarities to the Tibetan, while Mr. Clifford expressed an 

 opinion that he could find a connection between the dialects 

 of the Sakais and the Semangs on one side and those of 

 the Dayaks of Borneo and the Papuans of New Guinea on the 

 other, but later investigations have proved that all these lan- 

 guages are altogether dissimilar in phonology, grammar and 

 syntax. 



A complete vocabulary of the Sakai dialects is yet a great 

 desideratum of the linguistic science, and while the following 

 list of words does not claim to be at all complete, even of the 

 dialect represented, the author gives it to the public to en- 

 courage future investigators to further effort. No trouble has 

 been spared to express the sounds of the language as clearly 

 as possible in accordance with the most approved standards of 

 phonetic transliteration, and in that respect the following pages 

 may even be useful where they repeat words known from 

 earlier vocabularies. Though endeavouring to give as many 

 pure Sakai words as could be found, the author has regarded 

 it necessary to give in some instances Malay words (sometimes 

 more or less corrupted) where such have crept into every-day 

 use among the people ; these are marked with an asterisk. No 

 student of the language and customs of the Sakais can fail to 



