The English word for the people from the Netherlands (‘Dutch’) and German word for German ('Deutsch) have exactly the same root. Back then the word referred to a much larger group of people. Over time these languages became more distinctly different languages (as opposed to different versions of a similar language) and the English decided to give the German language a new name and not the Dutch.
Looking back it would have made more sense to continue calling German Dutch because it is more similar to the German word. We use Nederland (Netherland) as name for our country and Nederlands (Netherlandish / Netherlandic) as name for our language.
The English word for the people from the Netherlands (‘Dutch’) and German word for German ('Deutsch) have exactly the same root. Back then the word referred to a much larger group of people. Over time these languages became more distinctly different languages (as opposed to different versions of a similar language) and the English decided to give the German language a new name and not the Dutch.
Looking back it would have made more sense to continue calling German Dutch because it is more similar to the German word. We use Nederland (Netherland) as name for our country and Nederlands (Netherlandish / Netherlandic) as name for our language.