In Search of Princess Urduja
I found these scanned pages from the book Cathay and the Way Thither; being a collection of Medieval Notices of China while searching for some available articles online about Pangasinan's beleaguered Princess Urduja. Pages 233-237 are about the brief sojourn of Ibn Batuta in the country of Tawalisi and his meeting with Princess Urduja.
Some Pangasinan historians and literati claimed that Urduja's kingdom was in Pangasinan. Most of our historians nowadays, however, do not support such claim and that the Turkish-speaking princess was not from Pangasinan.
I believe that Urduja did not speak the Turkish tongue. She may have learned the words Husn misen yakhshi misen (Khush misan? Yakhshi misan?) from her duennas who acted as her counsellors.
The line Dawat wa batak katur, roughly translated by Batuta as "bring inkstand and paper" sounds like Pangasinan. But I would literally translate this as "paper and ink here."
The ancient word for paper in Pangasinan is lost but we still have the word batak (ink) or batakan (to sign). Batak is akin to Tagalog word patak (drop).
Dawat sounds like yawat (handover) or gawat (reach) in Pangasinan language. Interesting, huh?
I found these scanned pages from the book Cathay and the Way Thither; being a collection of Medieval Notices of China while searching for some available articles online about Pangasinan's beleaguered Princess Urduja. Pages 233-237 are about the brief sojourn of Ibn Batuta in the country of Tawalisi and his meeting with Princess Urduja.
Some Pangasinan historians and literati claimed that Urduja's kingdom was in Pangasinan. Most of our historians nowadays, however, do not support such claim and that the Turkish-speaking princess was not from Pangasinan.
I believe that Urduja did not speak the Turkish tongue. She may have learned the words Husn misen yakhshi misen (Khush misan? Yakhshi misan?) from her duennas who acted as her counsellors.
The line Dawat wa batak katur, roughly translated by Batuta as "bring inkstand and paper" sounds like Pangasinan. But I would literally translate this as "paper and ink here."
The ancient word for paper in Pangasinan is lost but we still have the word batak (ink) or batakan (to sign). Batak is akin to Tagalog word patak (drop).
Dawat sounds like yawat (handover) or gawat (reach) in Pangasinan language. Interesting, huh?
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