Lambert ten Kate

Lambert ten Kate (23 January 1674 – 14 December 1731) was a Dutch linguist. Specialised in comparative historical linguistics, he was also a well-known art collector.

Lambert ten Kate
Portrait of Lambert ten Kate
(engraving by Jacob Houbraken)
Born23 January 1674
Amsterdam
Died14 December 1731(1731-12-14) (aged 57)
Amsterdam

Early life

Ten Kate was born in Amsterdam to Mennonite parents.[1] He studied at the Haarlem Collegium Physicum and was a pupil of Adriaan Verwer.[2]

Career

Early in his career, ten Kate was a merchant, as a partner with his father, Herman ten Kate (1644–1706). The ten Kates engaged in the business of trading in corns, but it was not a preference for the younger man. He eventually left the family business, giving his attention to linguistics, especially, historical-comparative work, etymology, methodology and the standard language. An early phonetician,[3] he wrote linguistic and theological treatises on Dutch and other Germanic languages. His first published work on linguistics was at the instigation of Verwer. In his Aenleiding tot de kennisse van het verhevene deel der Nederduitsche sprake (1723), he made scientific comparisons of older language stages. By observation of the written and spoken language of his own time, he developed linguistic rules to detect and capture language changes. As his publications were all in his native Dutch and not in Latin, he was not known internationally.[1] His notable work, Geméénschap tussen de Gottische spraeke en de Nederduytsche ('Affinities and Similarities between the Dutch and Gothic Languages) was published anonymously in 1710. Thirteen years later, his magnum opus was a two-volume Aenleiding tot de kennisse van het verhevene deel der Nederduitsche sprake ('Introduction to the Knowledge of the Most Important Part of the Dutch Language').[4]

Death

He died of a lingering illness in Amsterdam in 1731,[1] and was buried in the Noorderkerk.[2]

See also
  • Canon of Dutch Literature

References
  1. Auroux, Sylvain (1 January 2001). Auroux, Sylvain; Koerner, E.F.K.; Niederehe, Hans-Josef; Versteegh, Kees: History of the Language Sciences / Geschichte der Sprachwissenschaften / Histoire des sciences du langage. 2. Teilband. Walter de Gruyter. pp. 1116–. ISBN 978-3-11-019421-0. Retrieved 20 January 2013.
  2. Noordegraaf, J.; Koerner, E. F. K. (1992). The History of Linguistics in the Low Countries. John Benjamins Publishing. pp. 203–. ISBN 978-90-272-4551-9. Retrieved 24 January 2013.
  3. Dekker, Cornelis (1998). The origins of Old Germanic studies in the Low Countries. BRILL. pp. 343–. ISBN 978-90-04-11031-1. Retrieved 24 January 2013.
  4. "Lambert ten Kate and Eighteenth-Century Dutch Linguistics" (pdf). Open Access Leiden University. Retrieved 21 January 2013.

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