| God, diet al bi redene doet, Gaf dat wandel ertsche goet Der menschelt gemene, Dattere mede ware gevoet, Ende gecleet, ende gescoet, Ende leven soude rene. Nu es giericheit so verwoet, Dat elc settet sinen moet Om al te hebbene allene. Hieromme stortmen menschenbloet, Hieromme stichtmen metter spoet Borge ende hoge stene Menegen te wene. | God, die het al met wijsheid doet, Gaf dit verganklijk aardsche goed Den menschen in’t gemeen, Op dat zij zouden zijn gevoed, Het lijf gekleed, geschoeid de voet En leven rein van zeen. Maar zie nu hoe de hebzucht woedt Dat iedereen in arren moed ’t Al hebben wil alleen’ Hierom vergiet men menschenbloed En bouwt met roekeloozen spoed Burchtsloten, zwaar van steen, Tot smart van menigeen. |
A Survey of the Sounds used in Dutch.—The Consonants. As regards the consonants, Dutch in the main does not differ from the other Low German languages. The explosive g and the th are wanting. Instead of the former there is a g with “fricative” pronunciation, and as in High German the th has passed over into d.
The final consonants in Middle Dutch are sharpened, and the sharp sounds are graphically represented; in Modern Dutch, on the other hand, the historical development of the language being more distinctly kept in view, and the agreement observed with the inflexional forms, the soft consonant is written more frequently than it is sounded; thus we have Middle Dutch dach, Modern Dutch dag, in analogy with the plural dagen.
The gutturals are g, k, ch and h.
G is the soft spirant, not used in English. In Middle Dutch this letter was also indicated by gh. K was pronounced like English k. In Middle Dutch c was sometimes used instead of k; now this is no longer done.
Ch (pronounced as German ch without the i-sound, not as English ch) loses its sound when combined with s to sch at the end of a syllable, for instance, vleesch, but the s-sound is not purely dental as in dans. As an initial consonant sch is nearly pronounced as sg (schip, English ship); only in Frisian and Saxon dialects the old consonant sk in skip, skool is retained.
H has the same pronunciation as in English.
The dentals are d and t. The d is formed by placing the point of the tongue against the upper teeth. At the end of a word d is sharpened into t, but written d, for instance, goed, pronounced gut. In the idiom of the east of the Netherlands final d is preserved. When between two vowels after oe (Engl. ô in do), ō, or ui, d is not pronounced, though it is written. After it has been left out, a j-sound has developed between the two vowels, so, for instance, goede became first goe:e and then goeje. Thus it is pronounced, though it is still spelled goede. After ou d disappeared and ou became ouw, for instance koude > kouw.
T has the same pronunciation as in English. In some dialects final t is dropped, for instance, heef for heeft, nie for niet.
S has the pronunciation of English s in sound, z that of English z in hazel; only in zestig and zeventig z has the pronunciation of s.