Hobson-Jobson/T
T
TABASHEER, s. 'Sugar of Bamboo.' A siliceous substance sometimes found in the joints of the bamboo, formerly prized as medicine, [also known in India as Bānslochan or Bānskapūr]. The word is Pers. tabāshīr, but that is from the Skt. name of the article, tvakkshīra, and tavakkshīra. The substance is often confounded, in name at least, by the old Materia Medica writers, with spodium and is sometimes called ispodio di canna. See Ces. Federici below. Garcia De Orta goes at length into this subject (f. 193 seqq.). [See SUGAR.]
1563.—"And much less are the roots of the cane tabaxer; so that according to both the translations Avicena is wrong; and Averrois says that it is charcoal from burning the canes of India, whence it appears that he never saw it, since he calls such a white substance charcoal."—Garcia, f. 195v.
c. 1570.—"Il Spodio si congela d'acqua in alcune canne, e io n'ho trouato assai nel Pegù quando faceuo fabricar la mia casa."—Ces. Federici, in Ramusio, iii. 397.
1578.—"The Spodium or Tabaxir of the Persians ... was not known to the Greeks."—Acosta, 295.
c. 1580.—"Spodium Tabaxir vocant, quo nomine vulgus pharmacopoeorum Spodium factitium, quippe metallicum, intelligunt. At eruditiores viri eo nomine lacrymam quandam, ex caudice arboris procerae in India nascentis, albicantem, odoratam, facultatis refrigeratoriae, et cor maxime roborantis itidem intelligunt."—Prosper Alpinus, Rerum Ægyptiarum, Lib. III. vii.
1598.—"... these Mambus have a certain Matter within them, which is (as it were) the pith of it ... the Indians call it Sacar Mambu, which is as much as to say, as Sugar of Mambu, and is a very deep Medicinable thing much esteemed, and much sought for by the Arabians, Persians, and Moores, that call it Tabaxiir."—Linschoten, p. 104; [Hak. Soc. ii. 56].
1837.—"Allied to these in a botanical point of view is Saccharum officinarum, which has needlessly been supposed not to have yielded saccharum, or the substance known by this name to the ancients; the same authors conjecturing this to be Tabasheer.... Considering that this substance is pure silex, it is not likely to have been arranged with the honeys and described under the head of περι Σακχαρον μελιτον."—Royle on the Ant. of Hindoo Medicine, p. 83. This confirms the views expressed in the article SUGAR.
1854.—"In the cavity of these cylinders water is sometimes secreted, or, less commonly, an opaque white substance, becoming opaline when wetted, consisting of a flinty secretion, of which the plant divests itself, called Tabasheer, concerning the optical properties of which Sir David Brewster has made some curious discoveries."—Engl. Cycl. Nat. Hist. Section, article Bamboo.
TABBY, s. Not Anglo-Indian. A kind of watered silk stuff; Sp. and Port. tabi, Ital. tabino, Fr. tabis, from Ar. 'attābī, the name said to have been given to such stuffs from their being manufactured in early times in a quarter of Baghdad called al-'attābīya; and this derived its name from a prince of the 'Omaiyad family called 'Attāb. [See Burton, Ar. Nights, ii. 371.]
TABOOT, s. The name applied in India to a kind of shrine, or model of a Mahommedan mausoleum, of flimsy material, intended to represent the tomb of Husain at Kerbela, which is carried in procession during the Moharram (see Herklots, 2nd ed. 119 seqq., and Garcin de Tassy, Rel. Musulm. dans l'Inde, 36). [The word is Ar. tabūt, 'a wooden box, coffin.' The term used in N. India is ta'ziya (see TAZEEA).]
[TACK-RAVAN, s. A litter carried on men's shoulders, used only by royal personages. It is Pers. takht-ravān, 'travelling-throne.' In the Hindi of Behar the word is corrupted into tartarwān.
TAEL, s. This is the trade-name of the Chinese ounce, viz., 1⁄16 of a catty (q.v.); and also of the Chinese money of account, often called "the ounce of silver," but in Chinese called liang. The standard liang or tael is, according to Dr. Wells Williams, = 579.84 grs. troy. It was formerly equivalent to a string of 1000 tsien, or (according to the trade-name) cash (q.v.). The China tael used to be reckoned as worth 6s. 8d., but the rate really varied with the price of silver. In 1879 an article in the Fortnightly Review puts it at 5s. 7½d. (Sept. p. 362); the exchange at Shanghai in London by telegraphic transfer, April 13, 1885, was 4s. 9⅜d.; [on Oct. 3, 1901, 2s. 7¼d.]. The word was apparently got from the Malays, among whom taïl or tahil is the name of a weight; and this again, as Crawfurd indicates, is probably from the India tola (q.v.). [Mr. Pringle writes: "Sir H. Yule does not refer to such forms as tahe (see below), taies (plural in Fryer's New Account, p. 210, sub Machawo), Taye (see quotation below from Saris), tayes (see quotation below from Mocquet), or taey, and taeys (Philip's translation of Linschoten, Hak. Soc. i. 149). These probably come through the medium of the Portuguese, in which the final l of the singular tael is changed into s in the plural. Such a form as taeis might easily suggest a singular wanting the final s, and from such a singular French and English plurals of the ordinary type would in turn be fashioned" (Diary Ft. St. Geo., 1st ser. ii. 126).]
The Chinese scale of weight, with their trade-names, runs: 16 taels = 1 catty, 100 catties = 1 pecul = 133½ lbs. avoird. Milburn gives the weights of Achin as 4 copangs (see KOPANG) = 1 mace, 5 mace = 1 mayam, 16 mayam = 1 tale (see TAEL), 5 tales = 1 buncal, 20 buncals = 1 catty, 200 catties = 1 bahar; and the catty of Achīn as = 2 lbs. 1 oz. 13 dr. Of these names, mace, tale and bahar (qq.v.) seem to be of Indian origin, mayam, bangkal, and kati Malay.
1598.—"A Tael is a full ounce and a halfe Portingale weight."—Linschoten, 44; [Hak. Soc. i. 149].
1599.—"Est et ponderis genus, quod Tael vocant in Malacca. Tael unum in Malacca pendet 16 masas."—De Bry, ii. 64.
" "Four hundred cashes make a cowpan (see KOBANG). Foure cowpans are one mas. Foure masses make a Perdaw (see PARDAO). Four Perdaws make a Tayel."—Capt. T. Davis, in Purchas, i. 123.
c. 1608.—"Bezar stones are thus bought by the Taile ... which is one Ounce, and the third part English."—Saris, in do., 392.
1613.—"A Taye is five shillinge sterling."—Saris, in do. 369.
1643.—"Les Portugais sont fort desireux de ces Chinois pour esclaves ... il y a des Chinois faicts à ce mestier ... quand ils voyent quelque beau petit garçon ou fille ... les enleuent par force et les cachent ... puis viennent sur la riue de la mer, ou ils sçauent que sont les trafiquans à qui ils les vendent 12 et 15 tayes chacun, qui est enuiron 25 escus."—Mocquet, 342.
c. 1656.—"Vn Religieux Chinois qui a esté surpris auec des femmes de debauche ... l'on a percé le col avec vn fer chaud; à ce fer est attaché vne chaisne de fer d'enuiron dix brasses qu'il est obligé de traisner jusques à ce qu'il ait apporté au Couuent trente theyls d'argent qu'il faut qu'il amasse en demandant l'aumosne."—In Thevenot, Divers Voyages, ii. 67.
[1683.—"The abovesaid Musk weyes Cattee 10: tahe 14: Mas 03...."—Pringle, Diary Ft. St. Geo., 1st ser. ii. 34.]
TAHSEELDAR, s. The chief (native) revenue officer of a subdivision (taḥsīl, conf. Pergunnah, Talook) of a district (see ZILLAH). Hind. from Pers. taḥsīldār, and that from Ar. taḥsīl, 'collection.' This is a term of the Mahommedan administration which we have adopted. It appears by the quotation from Williamson that the term was formerly employed in Calcutta to designate the cash-keeper in a firm or private establishment, but this use is long obsolete. [Possibly there was a confusion with taḥvīldār, 'a cashier.']
1799.—"... He (Tippoo) divided his country into 37 Provinces under Dewans (see DEWAUN) ... and he subdivided these again into 1025 inferior districts, having each a Tisheldar."—Letter of Munro, in Life, i. 215.
1808.—"... he continues to this hour tehsildar of the petty pergunnah of Sheopore."—Fifth Report, 583.
1810.—"... the sircar, or tusseeldar (cash-keeper) receiving one key, and the master retaining the other."—Williamson, V.M. i. 209.
[1826.—"... I told him ... that I was ... the bearer of letters to his head collector or T,huseeldam (sic) there."—Pandurang Hari, ed. 1873, i. 155.]
TAILOR-BIRD, s. This bird is so called from the fact that it is in the habit of drawing together "one leaf or more, generally two leaves, on each side of the nest, and stitches them together with cotton, either woven by itself, or cotton thread picked up; and after putting the thread through the leaf, it makes a knot at the end to fix it" (Jerdon). It is Orthrotomos longicauda, Gmelin (sub-fam. Drymoicinae).
TAJ, s. Pers. tāj, 'a crown.' The most famous and beautiful mausoleum in Asia; the Tāj Mahal at Agra, erected by Shāh Jahān over the burial-place of his favourite wife Mumtāz-i-Mahal ('Ornament of the Palace') Banū Begam.
1665.—"Of all the Monuments that are to be seen at Agra, that of the Wife of Cha-Jehan is the most magnificent; she caus'd it to be set up on purpose near the Tasimacan, to which all strangers must come, that they should admire it. The Tasimacan [? Tāj-i-mukām, 'Place of the Tāj'] is a great Bazar, or Market-place, comprised of six great courts, all encompass'd with Portico's; under which there are Warehouses for Merchants.... The monument of this Begum or Sultaness, stands on the East side of the City.... I saw the beginning and compleating of this great work, that cost two and twenty years labour, and 20,000 men always at work."—Tavernier, E.T. ii. 50; [ed. Ball, i. 109].
1856.—
"But far beyond compare, the glorious Taj,
Seen from old Agra's towering battlements,
And mirrored clear in Jumna's silent stream;
Sun-lighted, like a pearly diadem
Set royal on the melancholy brow
Of withered Hindostan; but, when the moon
Dims the white marble with a softer light,
Like some queened maiden, veiled in dainty lace,
And waiting for her bridegroom, stately, pale,
But yet transcendent in her loveliness."
The Banyan Tree.
TALAING, n.p. The name by which the chief race inhabiting Pegu (or the Delta of the Irawadi) is known to the Burmese. The Talaings were long the rivals of the Burmese, alternately conquering and conquered, but the Burmese have, on the whole, so long predominated, even in the Delta, that the use of the Talaing language is now nearly extinct in Pegu proper, though it is still spoken in Martaban, and among the descendants of emigrants into Siamese territory. We have adopted the name from the Burmese to designate the race, but their own name for their people is Mōn or Mūn (see MONE).
Sir Arthur Phayre has regarded the name Talaing as almost undoubtedly a form of Telinga. The reasons given are plausible, and may be briefly stated in two extracts from his Essay On the History of Pegu (J. As. Soc. Beng., vol. xlii. Pt. i.): "The names given in the histories of Tha-htun and Pegu to the first Kings of those cities are Indian; but they cannot be accepted as historically true. The countries from which the Kings are said to have derived their origin ... may be recognised as Karnáta, Kalinga, Venga and Vizianagaram ... probably mistaken for the more famous Vijayanagar.... The word Talingána never occurs in the Peguan histories, but only the more ancient name Kalinga" (op. cit. pp. 32-33). "The early settlement of a colony or city for trade, on the coast of Rámanya by settlers from Talingána, satisfactorily accounts for the name Talaing, by which the people of Pegu are known to the Burmese and all peoples of the west. But the Peguans call themselves by a different name ... Mun, Mwun, or Mon" (ibid. p. 34).
Prof. Forchhammer, however, who has lately devoted much labour to the study of Talaing archæology and literature, entirely rejects this view. He states that prior to the time of Alompra's conquest of Pegu (middle of 18th century) the name Talaing was entirely unknown as an appellation of the Muns, and that it nowhere occurs in either inscriptions or older palm-leaves, and that by all nations of Further India the people in question is known by names related to either Mun or Pegu. He goes on: "The word 'Talaing' is the term by which the Muns acknowledged their total defeat, their being vanquished and the slaves of their Burmese conqueror. They were no longer to bear the name of Muns or Peguans. Alompra stigmatized them with an appellation suggestive at once of their submission and disgrace. Talaing means" (in the Mun language) "'one who is trodden under foot, a slave.'... Alompra could not have devised more effective means to extirpate the national consciousness of a people than by burning their books, forbidding the use of their language, and by substituting a term of abject reproach for the name under which they had maintained themselves for nearly 2000 years in the marine provinces of Burma. The similarity of the two words 'Talaing' and 'Telingana' is purely accidental; and all deductions, historical or etymological ... from the resemblance ... must necessarily be void ab initio" (Notes on Early Hist. and Geog. of Br. Burma, Pt. ii. pp. 11-12, Rangoon, 1884).
Here we leave the question. It is not clear whether Prof. F. gives the story of Alompra as a historical fact, or as a probable explanation founded on the etymology. Till this be clear we cannot say that we are altogether satisfied. But the fact that we have been unable to find any occurrence of Talaing earlier than Symes's narrative is in favour of his view.
Of the relics of Talaing literature almost nothing is known. Much is to be hoped from the studies of Prof. Forchhammer himself.
There are linguistic reasons for connecting the Talaing or Mun people with the so-called Kolarian tribes of the interior of India, but the point is not yet a settled one. [Mr. Baines notes coincidences between the Mon and Munda languages, and accepts the connection of Talaing with Telinga (Census Report, 1891, i. p. 128).]
TALAPOIN, s. A word used by the Portuguese, and after them by French and other Continental writers, as well as by some English travellers of the 17th century, to designate the Buddhist monks of Ceylon and the Indo-Chinese countries. The origin of the expression is obscure. Monseigneur Pallegoix, in his Desc. du Royaume Thai ou Siam (ii. 23) says: "Les Européens les ont appelés talapoins, probablement du nom de l'éventail qu'ils tiennent à la main, lequel s'appelle talapat, qui signifie feuille de palmier." Childers gives Talapannam, Pali, 'a leaf used in writing, &c.' This at first sight seems to have nothing to support it except similarity of sound; but the quotations from Pinto throw some possible light, and afford probability to this origin, which is also accepted by Koeppen (Rel. des Buddhas, i. 331 note), and by Bishop Bigandet (J. Ind. Archip. iv. 220). [Others, however, derive it from Peguan Tilapoin, tala (not tila), 'lord,' poin, 'wealth.']
" "O Chaubainha lhe mandou hũa carta por hum seu Grepo Talapoy, religioso já de idade de oitenta annos."—Pinto, ch. cxlix. By Cogan: "The Chaubinhaa sent the King a Letter by one of his Priests that was fourscore years of age."—Cogan, 199.
[1566.—"Talapoins." See under COSMIN.]
c. 1583.—"... Sì veggono le case di legno tutte dorate, et ornate di bellissimi giardini fatti alla loro vsanza, nelle quali habitano tutti i Talapoi, che sono i loro Frati, che stanno a gouerno del Pagodo."—Gasparo Balbi, f. 96.
1586.—"There are ... many good houses for the Tallapoies to preach in."—R. Fitch, in Hakl. ii. 93.
1597.—"The Talipois persuaded the Iangoman, brother to the King of Pegu, to vsurpe the Kingdome, which he refused, pretending his Oath. They replied that no Religion hindered, if he placed his brother in the Vahat, that is, a Golden Throne, to be adored of the people for a God."—Nicolas Pimenta, in Purchas, ii. 1747.
1612.—"There are in all those Kingdoms many persons belonging to different Religious Orders; one of which in Pegu they call Talapois."—Couto, V. vi. 1.
1659.—"Whilst we looked on these temples, wherin these horrid idols sat, there came the Aracan Talpooys, or Priests, and fell down before the idols."—Walter Schulze, Reisen, 77.
1689.—"S'il vous arrive de fermer la bouche aux Talapoins et de mettre en évidence leurs erreurs, ne vous attendez qu'à les avoir pour ennemis implacables."—Lett. Edif. xxv. 64.
1690.—"Their Religious they call Telapoi, who are not unlike mendicant Fryers, living upon the Alms of the People, and so highly venerated by them that they would be glad to drink the Water wherein they wash their Hands."—Ovington, 592.
1696.—"... à permettre l'entrée de son royaume aux Talapoins."—La Bruyère, Caractères, ed. Jouast, 1881, ii. 305.
1725.—"This great train is usually closed by the Priests or Talapois and Musicians."—Valentijn, v. 142.
1727.—"The other Sects are taught by the Talapoins, who ... preach up Morality to be the best Guide to human Life, and affirm that a good Life in this World can only recommend us in the next to have our Souls transmigrated into the Body of some innocent Beast."—A. Hamilton, i. 151; [ed. 1744, i. 152].
" "The great God, whose Adoration is left to their Tallapoies or Priests."—Ibid. ii.; [ed. 1744, ii. 54].
1759.—"When asked if they believed the existence of any Superior Being, they (the Carianners (Carens)) replied that the Bûraghmahs and Pegu Tallopins told them so."—Letter in Dalrymple, Or. Rep. i. 100.
1766.—"André Des Couches. Combien avez-vous de soldats? Croutef. Quatre-vingt-mille, fort médiocrement payés. A. des C. Et de talapoins? Cr. Cent vingt mille, tous faineans et très riches. Il est vrai que dans la dernière guerre nous avons été bien battus; mais, en récompense, nos talapoins ont fait très grande chère," &c.—Voltaire, Dial. xxii. André Des Couches à Siam.
c. 1818.—"A certain priest or Talapoin conceived an inordinate affection for a garment of an elegant shape, which he possessed, and which he diligently preserved to prevent its wearing out. He died without correcting his irregular affection, and immediately becoming a louse, took up his abode in his favourite garment."—Sangermano, p. 20.
1880.—"The Phongyies (Poongee), or Buddhist Monks, sometimes called Talapoins, a name given to them, and introduced into Europe by the Portuguese, from their carrying a fan formed of tála-pat, or palm-leaves."—Saty. Rev., Feb. 21, p. 266, quoting Bp. Bigandet.
TALEE, s. Tam. tāli. A small trinket of gold which is fastened by a string round the neck of a married woman in S. India. It may be a curious question whether the word may not be an adaptation from the Ar. tahlīl, "qui signifie proprement: prononcer la formule lâ ilâha illâ 'llâh.... Cette formule, écrite sur un morceau de papier, servait d'amulette ... le tout était renfermé dans un étui auquel on donnait le nom de tahlīl" (Dozy & Engelmann, 346). These Mahommedan tahlīls were worn by a band, and were the origin of the Span. word tali, 'a baldrick.' [But the talee is a Hindu, not a Mahommedan ornament, and there seems no doubt that it takes its name from Skt. tāla, 'the palmyra' (see TALIPOT), it being the original practice for women to wear this leaf dipped in saffron-water (Mad. Gloss. s.v. Logan, Malabar, i. 134).] The Indian word appears to occur first in Abraham Rogerius, but the custom is alluded to by early writers, e.g. Gouvea, Synodo, f. 43v.
1672.—"Among some of the Christians there is also an evil custom, that they for the greater tightening and fast-making of the marriage bond, allow the Bridegroom to tie a Tali or little band round the Bride's neck; although in my time this was as much as possible denounced, seeing that it is a custom derived from Heathenism."—Baldaeus, Zeylon (German), 408.
1674.—"The bridegroom attaches to the neck of the bride a line from which hang three little pieces of gold in honour of the three gods: and this they call Tale; and it is the sign of being a married woman."—Faria y Sousa, Asia Port., ii. 707.
1704.—"Praeterea, quum moris hujus Regionis sit, ut infantes sex vel septem annorum, interdum etiam in teneriori aetate, ex genitorum consensu, matrimonium indissolubile de praesenti contrahant, per impositionem Talii, seu aureae tesserae nuptialis, uxoris collo pensilis: missionariis mandamus ne hujusmodi irrita matrimonia inter Christianos fieri permittant."—Decree of Card. Tournon, in Norbert, Mem. Hist. i. 155.
1726.—"And on the betrothal day the Tali, or bride's betrothal band, is tied round her neck by the Bramin ... and this she must not untie in her husband's life."—Valentijn, Choro. 51.
[1813.—"... the tali, which is a ribbon with a gold head hanging to it, is held ready; and, being shown to the company, some prayers and blessings are pronounced; after which the bridegroom takes it, and hangs it about the bride's neck."—Forbes, Or. Mem. 2nd ed. ii. 312.]
TALIAR, TARRYAR, s. A watchman (S. India). Tam. talaiyāri, [from talai, 'head,' a chief watchman].
1693.—"Taliars and Peons appointed to watch the Black Town...."—In Wheeler, i. 267.
1707.—"Resolving to march 250 soldiers, 200 talliars, and 200 peons."—Ibid. ii. 74.
[1800.—"In every village a particular officer, called Talliari, keeps watch at night, and is answerable for all that may be stolen."—Buchanan, Mysore, i. 3.]
TALIPOT, s. The great-leaved fan-palm of S. India and Ceylon, Corypha umbraculifera, L. The name, from Skt. tāla-pattra, Hind. tālpāt, 'leaf of the tāla tree,' properly applies to the leaf of such a tree, or to the smaller leaf of the palmyra (Borassus flabelliformis), used for many purposes, e.g. for slips to write on, to make fans and umbrellas, &c. See OLLAH, PALMYRA, TALAPOIN. Sometimes we find the word used for an umbrella, but this is not common. The quotation from Jordanus, though using no name, refers to this tree. [Arrian says: "These trees were called in Indian speech tala, and there grew on them, as there grows at the tops of the palm-trees, a fruit resembling balls of wool" (Indika, vii.).]
c. 1430.—"These leaves are used in this country for writing upon instead of paper, and in rainy weather are carried on the head as a covering, to keep off the wet. Three or four persons travelling together can be covered by one of these leaves stretched out." And again: "There is also a tree called tal, the leaves of which are extremely large, and upon which they write."—N. Conti, in India in the XV. Cent., 7 and 13.
1672.—"Talpets or sunshades."—Baldaeus, Dutch ed., 102.
1681.—"There are three other trees that must not be omitted. The first is Talipot...."—Knox, 15.
" "They (the priests) have the honour of carrying the Tallipot with the broad end over their heads foremost; which none but the King does."—Ibid. 74. [See TALAPOIN.]
1803.—"The talipot tree ... affords a prodigious leaf, impenetrable to sun or rain, and large enough to shelter ten men. It is a natural umbrella, and is of as eminent service in that country as a great-coat tree would be in this. A leaf of the talipot-tree is a tent to the soldier, a parasol to the traveller, and a book to the scholar."—Sydney Smith, Works, 3rd ed. iii. 15.
1874.—"... dans les embrasures ... s'étalaient des bananiers, des tallipots...."—Franz, Souvenirs d'un Cosaque, ch. iv.
1881.—"The lofty head of the talipot palm ... the proud queen of the tribe in Ceylon, towers above the scrub on every side. Its trunk is perfectly straight and white, like a slender marble column, and often more than 100 feet high. Each of the fans that compose the crown of leaves covers a semicircle of from 12 to 16 feet radius, a surface of 150 to 200 square feet."—Haeckel's Visit to Ceylon, E.T. p. 129.
TALISMAN, s. This word is used by many medieval and post-medieval writers for what we should now call a moollah, or the like, a member of the Mahommedan clergy, so to call them. It is doubtless the corruption of some Ar. term, but of what it is not easy to say. Qu. talāmiẓa, 'disciples, students'? [See Burton, Ar. Nights, ix. 165.] On this Prof. Robertson Smith writes: "I have got some fresh light on your Talisman.
"W. Bedwell, the father of English Arabists, in his Catalogue of the Chapters of the Turkish Alkoran, published (1615) along with the Mohammedis Imposturae, and Arabian Trudgman, has the following, quoted from Postellus de Orbis Concordia, i. 13: 'Haec precatio (the fātiḥa) illis est communis ut nobis dominica: et ita quibusdum ad battologiam usque recitatur ut centies idem, aut duo aut tria vocabula repetant dicendo, Alhamdu lillah, hamdu lillah, hamdu lillah, et cetera ejus vocabula eodem modo. Idque facit in publicà oratione Taalima, id est sacrificulus, pro his qui negligenter orant ut aiunt, ut ea repititione suppleat eorum erroribus.... Quidam medio in campo tam assiduè, ut defessi considant; alii circumgirando corpus,' etc.
"Here then we have a form without the s, and one which from the vowels seem to be ti'lima, 'a very learned man.' This, owing to the influence of the guttural, would sound in modern pronunciation nearly as Taalima. At the same time ti'lima is not the name of an office, and prayers on behalf of others can be undertaken by any one who receives a mandate, and is paid for them; so it is very possible that Postellus, who was an Arabic scholar, made the pointing suit his idea of the word meant, and that the real word is talāmi, a shortened form, recognised by Jawhari, and other lexicographers, of talāmidh, 'disciples.' That students should turn a penny by saying prayers for others is very natural." This, therefore, confirms our conjecture of the origin.
1471.—"In questa città è vna fossa d'acqua nel modo di vna fontana, la qual'è guardata da quelli suoi Thalassimani, cioè preti; quest'acqua dicono che ha gran vertù contra la lebra, e contra le caualette."—Giosafa Barbaro, in Ramusio, ii. f. 107.
1535.—
"Non vi sarebbe più confusione
S'a Damasco il Soldan desse l'assalto;
Un muover d'arme, un correr di persone
E di talacimanni un gridar d'alto."
Ariosto, xviii. 7.
1554.—"Talismánnos habent hominum genus templorum ministerio dicatum...."—Busbeq. Epistola. i. p. 40.
c. 1590.—"Vt Talismanni, qui sint commodius intelligatur: sciendum, certos esse gradus Mahumetanis eorum qui legum apud ipsos periti sunt, et partim jus dicunt, partim legem interpretantur. Ludovicus Bassanus Iadrensis in hunc modum comparat eos cum nostris Ecclesiasticis.... Muphtim dicit esse inter ipsos instar vel Papae nostro, vel Patriarchae Graecorum.... Huic proximi sunt Cadilescheri.... Bassanus hos cum Archiepiscopis nostris comparat. Sequuntur Cadij ... locum obtinent Episcopi. Secundum hos sunt eis Hoggiae,[1] qui seniores dicuntur, vt Graecis et nostris Presbyteri. Excipiunt Hoggias Talismani, seu Presbyteros Diaconi. Vltimi sunt Dervisii, qui Calogeris Graecorum, monachis nostris respondent. Talismani Mahumetanis ad preces interdiu et noctu quinquis excitant."—Leunclavius, Annales Sultanorum Othmanidarum, ed. 1650, 414.
1610.—"Some hauing two, some foure, some sixe adioyning turrets, exceeding high, and exceeding slender: tarrast aloft on the outside like the maine top of a ship ... from which the Talismanni with elated voices (for they vse no bels) do congregate the people...."—Sandys, p. 31.
c. 1630.—"The Fylalli converse most in the Alcoran. The Deruissi are wandering wolves in sheepes clothing. The Talismanni regard the houres of prayer by turning the 4 hour'd glasse. The Muyezini crie from the tops of Mosques, battologuizing Llala Hyllula."—Sir T. Herbert, 267; [and see ed. 1677, p. 323].
1678.—"If he can read like a Clerk a Chapter out of the Alcoran ... he shall be crowned with the honour of being a Mullah or Talman...."—Fryer, 368.
1687.—"... It is reported by the Turks that ... the victorious Sultan ... went with all Magnificent pomp and solemnity to pay his thanksgiving and devotions at the church of Sancta Sophia; the Magnificence so pleased him, that he immediately added a yearly Rent of 10,000 zechins to the former Endowments, for the maintenance of Imaums or Priests, Doctours of their Law, Talismans and others who continually attend there for the education of youth...."—Sir P. Rycaut, Present State of the Ottoman Empire, p. 54.
TĀLIYAMĀR, s. Sea-Hind. for 'cut-water.' Port. talhamar.—Roebuck.
TALLICA, s. Hind. from Ar. ta'līḳah. An invoice or schedule.
TALOOK, s. This word, Ar. ta'alluḳ, from root 'alaḳ, 'to hang or depend,' has various shades of meaning in different parts of India. In S. and W. India it is the subdivision of a district, presided over as regards revenue matters by a tahseeldar. In Bengal it is applied to tracts of proprietary land, sometimes not easily distinguished from Zemindaries, and sometimes subordinate to or dependent on Zemindars. In the N.W. Prov. and Oudh the ta'alluḳ is an estate the profits of which are divided between different proprietors, one being superior, the other inferior (see TALOOKDAR). Ta'alluḳ is also used in Hind. for 'department' of administration.
TALOOKDĀR, s. Hind. from Pers. ta'alluḳdār, 'the holder of a ta'alluḳ' (see TALOOK) in either of the senses of that word; i.e. either a Government officer collecting the revenue of a ta'alluḳ (though in this sense it is probably now obsolete everywhere), or the holder of an estate so designated. The famous Talookdars of Oudh are large landowners, possessing both villages of which they are sole proprietors, and other villages, in which there are subordinate holders, in which the Talookdar is only the superior proprietor (see Carnegie, Kachari Technicalities).
TAMARIND, s. The pod of the tree which takes its name from that product, Tamarindus indica, L., N.O. Leguminosae. It is a tree cultivated throughout India and Burma for the sake of the acid pulp of the pod, which is laxative and cooling, forming a most refreshing drink in fever. The tree is not believed by Dr. Brandis to be indigenous in India, but is supposed to be so in tropical Africa. The origin of the name is curious. It is Ar. tamar-u'l-Hind, 'date of India,' or perhaps rather in Persian form, tamar-i-Hindī. It is possible that the original name may have been thamar, 'fruit' of India, rather than tamar, 'date.'
c. 1335.—"L'arbre appelé ḥammar, c'est à dire al-tamar-al-Hindi, est un arbre sauvage qui couvre les montagnes."—Masālik-al-abṣar, in Not. et Ext. xiii. 175.
1563.—"It is called in Malavar puli, and in Guzerat ambili, and this is the name they have among all the other people of this India; and the Arab calls it tamarindi, because tamar, as you well know, is our tamara, or, as the Castilians say, datil [i.e. date], so that tamarindi are 'dates of India'; and this was because the Arabs could not think of a name more appropriate on account of its having stones inside, and not because either the tree or the fruit had any resemblance."—Garcia, f. 200. [Puli is the Malayāl. name; ambilii is probably Hind. imlī, Skt. amlikā, 'the tamarind.']
c. 1580.—"In febribus verò pestilentibus, atque omnibus aliis ex putridis, exurentibus, aquam, in qua multa copia Tamarindorum infusa fuerit cum saccharo ebibunt."—Prosper Alpinus (De Plantis Aegypt.) ed. Lugd. Bat. 1735, ii. 20.
1582.—"They have a great store of Tamarindos...."—Castañeda, by N.L. f. 94.
[1598.—"Tamarinde is by the Aegyptians called Derelside (qu. dār-al-sayyida, 'Our Lady's tree'?)."—Linschoten, Hak. Soc. ii. 121.]
1611.—"That wood which we cut for firewood did all hang trased with cods of greene fruit (as big as a Bean-cod in England) called Tamerim; it hath a very soure tast, and by the Apothecaries is held good against the Scurvie."—N. Dounton, in Purchas, i. 277.
[1623.—"Tamarinds, which the Indians call Hambele" (imlī, as in quotation from Garcia above).—P. della Valle, Hak. Soc. i. 92.]
1829.—"A singularly beautiful Tamarind tree (ever the most graceful, and amongst the most magnificent of trees)...."—Mem. of Col. Mountain, 98.
1877.—"The natives have a saying that sleeping beneath the 'Date of Hind' gives you fever, which you cure by sleeping under a nim tree (Melia azedirachta), the lilac of Persia."—Burton, Sind Revisited, i. 92. The nim (see NEEM) (pace Capt. Burton) is not the 'lilac of Persia' (see BUCKYNE). The prejudice against encamping or sleeping under a tamarind tree is general in India. But, curiously, Bp. Pallegoix speaks of it as the practice of the Siamese "to rest and play under the beneficent shade of the Tamarind."—(Desc. du Royaume Thai ou Siam, i. 136).
TAMARIND-FISH, s. This is an excellent zest, consisting, according to Dr. Balfour, of white pomfret, cut in transverse slices, and preserved in tamarinds. The following is a note kindly given by the highest authority on Indian fish matters, Dr. Francis Day:
TAMBERANEE, s. Malayāl. tam-burān, 'Lord; God, or King.' It is a title of honour among the Nairs, and is also assumed by Saiva monks in the Tamil countries. [The word is derived from Mal. tam, 'one's own,' purān, 'lord.' The junior male members of the Malayāli Rāja's family, until they come of age, are called Tambān, and after that Tamburān. The female members are similarly styled Tambaṭṭi and Tamburaṭṭi (Logan, Malabar, iii. Gloss. s.v.).]
TANA, TANNA, n.p. Thāna, a town on the Island of Salsette on the strait ('River of Tana') dividing that island from the mainland and 20 m. N.E. of Bombay, and in the early Middle Ages the seat of a Hindu kingdom of the Konkan (see CONCAN), as well as a seaport of importance. It is still a small port, and is the chief town of the District which bears its name.
[c. 1150.—"Tanah," miswritten Banah. See under TABASHEER.]
1298.—"Tana is a great Kingdom lying towards the West.... There is much traffic here, and many ships and merchants frequent the place."—Marco Polo, Bk. III. ch. 27.
1321.—"After their blessed martyrdom, which occurred on the Thursday before Palm Sunday in Thana of India, I baptised about 90 persons in a certain city called Parocco, ten days' journey distant therefrom, and I have since baptised more than twenty, besides thirty-five who were baptised between Thana and Supera (Supara)."—Letter of Friar Jordanus, in Cathay, &c., 226.
c. 1323.—"And having thus embarked I passed over in 28 days to Tana, where for the faith of Christ four of our Minor Friars had suffered martyrdom.... The land is under the dominion of the Saracens...."—Fr. Odoric, Ibid. i. 57-58.
1516.—"25 leagues further on the coast is a fortress of the before-named king, called Tana-Mayambu" (this is perhaps rather Bombay).—Barbosa, 68.
1529.—"And because the norwest winds blew strong, winds contrary to his course, after going a little way he turned and anchored in sight of the island, where were stationed the foists with their captain-in-chief Alixa, who seeing our fleet in motion put on his oars and assembled at the River of Tana, and when the wind came round our fleet made sail, and anchored at the mouth of the River of Tana, for the wind would not allow of its entering."—Correa, iii. 290.
1673.—"The Chief City of this Island is called Tanaw; in which are Seven Churches and Colleges, the chiefest one of the Paulistines (see PAULIST).... Here are made good Stuffs of Silk and Cotton."—Fryer, 73.
TANA, THANA, s. A Police station. Hind. thāna, thānā, [Skt. sthāna, 'a place of standing, a post']. From the quotation following it would seem that the term originally meant a fortified post, with its garrison, for the military occupation of the country; a meaning however closely allied to the present use.
TANADAR, THANADAR, s. The chief of a police station (see TANA), Hind. thānadār. This word was adopted in a more military sense at an early date by the Portuguese, and is still in habitual use with us in the civil sense.
1519.—"Senhor Duarte Pereira; this is the manner in which you will exercise your office of Tannadar of this Isle of Tyçoari (i.e. Goa), which the Senhor Capitão will now encharge you with."—Ibid. p. 35.
c. 1548.—"In Aguaci is a great mosque (mizquita), which is occupied by the tenadars, but which belongs to His Highness; and certain petayas, (yards?) in which bate (paddy) is collected, which also belong to His Highness."—Tombo in Subsidios, 216.
1602.—"So all the force went aboard of the light boats, and the Governor in his bastard-galley entered the river with a grand clangour of music, and when he was in mid-channel there came to his galley a boat, in which was the Tanadar of the City (Dabul), and going aboard the galley presented himself to the Governor with much humility, and begged pardon of his offences...."—Couto, IV. i. 9.
[1813.—"The third in succession was a Tandar, or petty officer of a district...."—Forbes, Or. Mem. 2nd ed. ii. 5.]
TANGA, s. Mahr. ṭānk, Turki tanga. A denomination of coin which has been in use over a vast extent of territory, and has varied greatly in application. It is now chiefly used in Turkestan, where it is applied to a silver coin worth about 7½d. And Mr. W. Erskine has stated that the word tanga or tanka is of Chagatai Turki origin, being derived from tang, which in that language means 'white' (H. of Baber and Humayun, i. 546). Though one must hesitate in differing from one usually so accurate, we must do so here. He refers to Josafa Barbaro, who says this, viz. that certain silver coins are called by the Mingrelians tetari, by the Greeks aspri, by the Turks akcha, and by the Zagatais tengh, all of which words in the respective languages signify 'white.' We do not however find such a word in the dictionaries of either Vambéry or of Pavet de Courteille;—the latter only having tangah, 'fer-blanc.' And the obvious derivation is the Skt. ṭaṅka, 'a weight (of silver) equal to 4 māshas ... a stamped coin.' The word in the forms ṭakā (see TUCKA) and ṭanga (for these are apparently identical in origin) is, "in all dialects, laxly used for money in general" (Wilson).
In the Lahore coinage of Mahmūd of Ghaznī, A.H. 418-419 (A.D. 1027-28), we find on the Skt. legend of the reverse the word ṭanka in correspondence with the dirham of the Ar. obverse (see Thomas, Pathan Kings, p. 49). Ṭanka or Ṭanga seems to have continued to be the popular name of the chief silver coin of the Delhi sovereigns during the 13th and first part of the 14th centuries, a coin which was substantially the same with the rupee (q.v.) of later days. In fact this application of the word in the form ṭakā (see TUCKA) is usual in Bengal down to our own day. Ibn Batuta indeed, who was in India in the time of Mahommed Tughlak, 1333-1343 or thereabouts, always calls the gold coin then current a tanka or dīnār of gold. It was, as he repeatedly states, the equivalent of 10 silver dīnārs. These silver dīnārs (or rupees) are called by the author of the Masālik-al-Abṣār (c. 1340) the "silver tanka of India." The gold and silver tanka continue to be mentioned repeatedly in the history of Feroz Shāh, the son of Mahommed (1351-1388), and apparently with the same value as before. At a later period under Sikandar Buhlol (1488-1517), we find black (or copper) tankas, of which 20 went to the old silver tanka.
We cannot say when the coin, or its name rather, first appeared in Turkestan.
But the name was also prevalent on the western coast of India as that of a low denomination of coin, as may be seen in the quotations from Linschoten and Grose. Indeed the name still survives in Goa as that of a copper coin equivalent to 60 reis or about 2d. And in the 16th century also 60 reis appears from the papers of Gerson da Cunha to have been the equivalent of the silver tanga of Goa and Bassein, though all the equations that he gives suggest that the rei may have been more valuable then.
The denomination is also found in Russia under the form dengi. See a quotation under COPECK, and compare PARDAO.
c. 1340.—"Then I returned home after sunset and found the money at my house. There were 3 bags containing in all 6233 tankas, i.e. the equivalent of the 55,000 dīnārs (of silver) which was the amount of my debts, and of the 12,000 which the sultan had previously ordered to be paid me, after of course deducting the tenth part according to Indian custom. The value of the piece called tanka is 2½ dīnārs in gold of Barbary."—Ibn Batuta, iii. 426. (Here the gold tanga is spoken of.)
c. 1370.—"Sultán Fíroz issued several varieties of coins. There was the gold tanka, and the silver tanka," &c.—Táríkh-i-Fíroz Sháhí, in Elliot, iii. 357.
1404.—"... vna sua moneda de plata que llaman Tangaes."—Clavijo, f. 46b.
1516.—"... a round coin like ours, and with Moorish letters on both sides, and about the size of a fanon (see FANAM) of Calicut, ... and its worth 55 maravedis; they call these tanga, and they are of very fine silver."—Barbosa, 45.
[1519.—Rules regulating ferry-dues at Goa: "they may demand for this one tamgua only."—Archiv. Port. Orient. fasc. 5, p. 18.]
c. 1541.—"Todar ... fixed first a golden ashrafi (see ASHRAFEE) as the enormous remuneration for one stone, which induced the Ghakkars to flock to him in such numbers that afterwards a stone was paid with a rupee, and this pay gradually fell to 5 tankas, till the fortress (Rōhtās) was completed."—Táríkh-i-Khán-Jahán Lodí, in Elliot, v. 115. (These are the Bahlūlī or Sikandarī tankas of copper, as are also those in the next quotation from Elliot.)
1559.—"The old Muscovite money is not round but oblong or egg-shaped, and is called denga.... 100 of these coins make a Hungarian gold-piece; 6 dengas make an altin; 20 a grifna; 100 a poltina; and 200 a ruble."—Herberstein, in Ramusio, ii. f. 158v.
[1571.—"Gujarati tankchahs at 100 tankchahs to the rupee. At the present time the rupee is fixed at 40 dams.... As the current value of the tankchah of Pattan, etc., was less than that of Gujarat."—Mirat-i-Ahmadī, in Bayley, Gujarat, pp. 6, 11.
[1591.—"Dingoes." See under RUBLE.]
1592-3.—"At the present time, namely, A.H. 1002, Hindustan contains 3200 towns, and upon each town are dependent 200, 500, 1000, or 1500 villages. The whole yields a revenue of 640 krors (see CRORE) murádí tankas."—Ṭabaḳāt-i-Akbarī, in Elliot, v. 186.
1598.—"There is also a kinde of reckoning of money which is called Tangas, not that there is any such coined, but are so named onely in telling, five Tangas is one Pardaw (see PARDAO), or Xeraphin badde money, for you must understande that in telling they have two kinds of money, good and badde, for foure Tangas good money are as much as five Tangas badde money."—Linschoten, ch. 35; [Hak. Soc. i. 241].
[c. 1610.—"The silver money of Goa is perdos, larins, Tangues, the last named worth 7 sols, 6 deniers a piece."—Pyrard de Laval, Hak. Soc. ii. 69.]
1615.—"Their moneyes in Persia of silver, are the ... the rest of copper, like the Tangas and Pisos (see PICE) of India."—Richard Steele, in Purchas, i. 543.
[c. 1630.—"There he expended fifty thousand Crow (see CRORE) of tacks ... sometimes twenty tack make one Roopee."—Sir T. Herbert, ed. 1677, p. 64.]
1673.—"Tango." See under REAS.
[1638.—"Their (at Surat) ordinary way of accompting is by lacs, each of which is worth 100,000 ropias (see RUPEE), and 100 lacs make a crou, or carroa (see CRORE), and 10 carroas make an Areb. A Theil (see TOLA, TAEL) of silver (? gold) makes 11, 12, or 13 ropias ready money. A massa (māshā) and a half make a Thiel of silver, 10 whereof make a Thiel of gold. They call their brass and copper-money Tacques."—Mandelslo, 107.]
c. 1750-60.—"Throughout Malabar and Goa, they use tangas, vintins, and Pardoo (see PARDAO) xeraphin."—Grose, i. 283. The Goa tanga was worth 60 reis, that of Ormus 6234⁄43 to 6933⁄43 reis.
[1753.—In Khiva "... Tongas, a small piece of copper, of which 1500 are equal to a ducat."—Hanway, i. 351.]
1815.—"... one tungah ... a coin about the value of fivepence."—Malcolm, H. of Persia, ii. 250.
[1876.—"... it seemed strange to me to find that the Russian word for money, denga or dengi, in the form tenga, meant everywhere in Central Asia a coin of twenty kopeks...."—Schuyler, Turkistan, i. 153.]
TANGUN, TANYAN, s. Hind. ṭānghan, ṭāngan; apparently from Tibetan rTaṅāṅ, the vernacular name of this kind of horse (rTa, 'horse'). The strong little pony of Bhutān and Tibet.
1774.—"2d. That for the possession of the Chitchanotta Province, the Deb Raja shall pay an annual tribute of five Tangan Horses to the Honorable Company, which was the acknowledgment paid to the Deb Raja."—Treaty of Peace between the H.E.I.C. and the Rajah of Bootan, in Aitchison's Treaties, i. 144.
" "We were provided with two tangun ponies of a mean appearance, and were prejudiced against them unjustly. On better acquaintance they turned out patient, sure-footed, and could climb the Monument."—Bogle's Narrative, in Markham, 17.
1780.—"... had purchased 35 Jhawah or young elephants, of 8 or 9 years old, 60 Tankun, or ponies of Manilla and Pegu."—H. of Hydur Naik, 383.
" "... small horses brought from the mountains on the eastern side of Bengal. These horses are called tanyans, and are mostly pyebald."—Hodges, Travels, 31.
1782.—"To be sold, a Phaeton, in good condition, with a pair of young Tanyan Horses, well broke."—India Gazette, Oct. 26.
1793.—"As to the Tanguns or Tanyans, so much esteemed in India for their hardiness, they come entirely from the Upper Tibet, and notwithstanding their make, are so sure footed that the people of Nepaul ride them without fear over very steep mountains, and along the brink of the deepest precipices."—Kirkpatrick's Nepaul, 135.
1854.—"These animals, called Tanghan, are wonderfully strong and enduring; they are never shod, and the hoof often cracks.... The Tibetans give the foals of value messes of pig's blood and raw liver, which they devour greedily, and it is said to strengthen them wonderfully; the custom is, I believe, general in Central Asia."—Hooker, Himalayan Journals, 1st ed. ii. 131.
TANJORE, n.p. A city and District of S. India; properly Tañjāvūr ('Low Town'?), so written in the inscription on the great Tanjore Pagoda (11th century). [The Madras Manual gives two derivations: "Tañjāvūr, familiarly called Tañjai by the natives. It is more fully given as Tañjai-mānagaram, Tañjan's great city, after its founder. Tañjam means 'refuge, shelter'" (ii. 216). The Gloss. gives Tañjāvūr, Tam. tañjam, 'asylum,' ūr, 'village.']
TANK, s. A reservoir, an artificial pond or lake, made either by excavation or by damming. This is one of those perplexing words which seem to have a double origin, in this case one Indian, the other European.
As regards what appears to be the Indian word, Shakespear gives: "Tānk'h (in Guzerat), an underground reservoir for water." [And so Platts.] Wilson gives: "Ṭánkeṇ or ṭákeṇ, Mahr. ... Tánkh (said to be Guzeráthí). A reservoir of water, an artificial pond, commonly known to Europeans in India as a Tank. Ṭánki, Guz. A reservoir of water; a small well." R. Drummond, in his Illustrations of Guzerattee, &c., gives: "Tanka (Mah.) and Tankoo (Guz.) Reservoirs, constructed of stone or brick or lime, of larger and lesser size, generally inside houses.... They are almost entirely covered at top, having but a small aperture to let a pot or bucket down."... "In the towns of Bikaner," says Tod, "most families have large cisterns or reservoirs called Tankas, filled by the rains" (Rajputana, ii. 202). Again, speaking of towns in the desert of Márwár, he says: "they collect the rain water in reservoirs called Tanka, which they are obliged to use sparingly, as it is said to produce night blindness" (ii. 300). Again, Dr. Spilsbury (J.A.S.B. ix. pt. 2, 891), describing a journey in the Nerbudda Basin, cites the word, and notes: "I first heard this word used by a native in the Betool district; on asking him if at the top of Bowergurh there was any spring, he said No, but there was a Tanka or place made of pukka (stone and cement) for holding water." Once more, in an Appendix to the Report of the Survey of India for 1881-1882, Mr. G. A. MacGill, speaking of the rain cisterns in the driest part of Rajputana, says: "These cisterns or wells are called by the people tánkás" (App. p. 12). See also quotation below from a Report by Major Strahan. It is not easy to doubt the genuineness of the word, which may possibly be from Skt. taḍaga, taṭāga, taṭāka, 'a pond, pool, or tank.'
Fr. Paolino, on the other hand, says the word tanque used by the Portuguese in India was Portoghesa corrotta, which is vague. But in fact tanque is a word which appears in all Portuguese dictionaries, and which is used by authors so early after the opening of communication with India (we do not know if there is an instance actually earlier) that we can hardly conceive it to have been borrowed from an Indian language, nor indeed could it have been borrowed from Guzerat and Rajpūtāna, to which the quotations above ascribe the vernacular word. This Portuguese word best suits, and accounts for that application of tank to large sheets of water which is habitual in India. The indigenous Guzerati and Mahratti word seems to belong rather to what we now call a tank in England; i.e. a small reservoir for a house or ship. Indeed the Port. tanque is no doubt a form of the Lat. stagnum, which gives It. stagno, Fr. old estang and estan, mod. étang, Sp. estanque, a word which we have also in old English and in Lowland Scotch, thus:
c. 1785.—
"I never drank the Muses' stank,
Castalia's burn and a' that;
But there it streams, and richly reams,
My Helicon I ca' that."—
Burns.
It will be seen that Pyrard de Laval uses estang, as if specifically, for the tank of India.
1498.—"And many other saints were there painted on the walls of the church, and these wore diadems, and their portraiture was in a divers kind, for their teeth were so great that they stood an inch beyond the mouth, and every saint had 4 or 5 arms, and below the church stood a great tanque wrought in cut stone like many others that we had seen by the way."—Roteiro de Vasco da Gama, 57.
" "So the Captain Major ordered Nicolas Coelho to go in an armed boat, and see where the water was, and he found in the said island (Anchediva) a building, a church of great ashlar work which had been destroyed by the Moors, as the country people said, only the chapel had been covered with straw, and they used to make their prayers to three black stones which stood in the midst of the body of the chapel. Moreover they found just beyond the church a tanque of wrought ashlar in which we took as much water as we wanted; and at the top of the whole island stood a great tanque of the depth of 4 fathoms, and moreover we found in front of the church a beach where we careened the ship Berrio."—Ibid. 95.
1510.—"Early in the morning these Pagans go to wash at a tank, which tank is a pond of still water (—ad uno Tancho il qual Tancho è una fossa d'acqua morta)."—Varthema, 149.
" "Near to Calicut there is a temple in the midst of a tank, that is, in the middle of a pond of water."—Ibid. 175.
1553.—"In this place where the King (Bahádur Sháh) established his line of battle, on one side there was a great river, and on the other a tank (tanque) of water, such as they are used to make in those parts. For as there are few streams to collect the winter's waters, they make these tanks (which might be more properly called lakes), all lined with stone. They are so big that many are more than a league in compass."—Barros, IV. vi. 5.
c. 1610.—"Son logis estoit éloigné près d'vne lieuë du palais Royal, situé sur vn estang, et basty de pierres, ayant bien demy lieuë de tour, comme rous les autres estangs."—Pyrard de Laval, ed. 1679, i. 262; [Hak. Soc. i. 367].
[1615.—"I rode early ... to the tancke to take the ayre."—Sir T. Roe, Hak. Soc. i. 78.]
1616.—"Besides their Rivers ... they have many Ponds, which they call Tankes."—Terry, in Purchas, ii. 1470.
1638.—"A very faire Tanke, which is a square pit paved with gray marble."—W. Bruton, in Hakl. v. 50.
1648.—"... a standing water or Tanck...."—Van Twist, Gen. Beschr. 11.
1672.—"Outside and round about Suratte, there are elegant and delightful houses for recreation, and stately cemeteries in the usual fashion of the Moors, and also divers Tanks and reservoirs built of hard and solid stone."—Baldaeus, p. 12.
1673.—"Within a square Court, to which a stately Gate-house makes a Passage, in the middle whereof a Tank vaulted...."—Fryer, 27.
1754.—"The post in which the party intended to halt had formerly been one of those reservoirs of water called tanks, which occur so frequently in the arid plains of this country."—Orme, i. 354.
1799.—"One crop under a tank in Mysore or the Carnatic yields more than three here."—T. Munro, in Life, i. 241.
1809.—
"Water so cool and clear,
The peasants drink not from the humble well.
* * * * *
Nor tanks of costliest masonry dispense
To those in towns who dwell,
The work of kings in their beneficence."
Kehama, xiii. 6.
TANOR, n.p. An ancient town and port about 22 miles south of Calicut. There is a considerable probability that it was the Tyndis of the Periplus. It was a small kingdom at the arrival of the Portuguese, in partial subjection to the Zamorin. [The name is Malayāl. Tānūr, tanni, the tree Terminalis belerica, ūr, village.]
1521.—"Cotate was a great man among the Moors, very rich, and lord of Tanor, who carried on a great sea-trade with many ships, which trafficked all about the coast of India with passes from our Governors, for he only dealt in wares of the country; and thus he was the greatest possible friend of the Portuguese, and those who went to his dwelling were entertained with the greatest honour, as if they had been his brothers. In fact for this purpose he kept houses fitted up, and both cots and bedsteads furnished in our fashion, with tables and chairs and casks of wine, with which he regaled our people, giving them entertainments and banquets, insomuch that it seemed as if he were going to become a Christian...."—Correa, ii. 679.
1528.—"And in the year (A.H.) 935, a ship belonging to the Franks was wrecked off Tanoor.... Now the Ray of that place affording aid to the crew, the Zamorin sent a messenger to him demanding of him the surrender of the Franks who composed it, together with such parts of the cargo of the ship as had been saved, but that chieftain having refused compliance with this demand, a treaty of peace was entered into with the Franks by him; and from this time the subjects of the Ray of Tanoor traded under the protection of the passes of the Franks."—Tohfut-ul-Mujahideen, E.T. 124-125.
1553.—"For Lopo Soares having arrived at Cochin after his victory over the Çamorin, two days later the King of Tanor, the latter's vassal, sent (to Lopo) to complain against the Çamorin by ambassadors, begging for peace and help against him, having fallen out with him for reasons that touched the service of the King of Portugal."—Barros, I. vii. 10.
1727.—"Four leagues more southerly is Tannore, a Town of small Trade, inhabited by Mahometans."—A. Hamilton, i. 322; [ed. 1744].
TAPPAUL, s. The word used in S. India for 'post,' in all the senses in which dawk (q.v.) is used in Northern India. Its origin is obscure. C. P. Brown suggests connection with the Fr. étape (which is the same originally as the Eng. staple). It is sometimes found in the end of the 18th century written tappa or tappy. But this seems to have been derived from Telugu clerks, who sometimes write tappā as a singular of tappālu, taking the latter for a plural (C.P.B.). Wilson appears to give the word a southern origin. But though its use is confined to the South and West, Mr. Beames assigns to it an Aryan origin: "ṭappā 'post-office,' i.e. place where letters are stamped, ṭappāl 'letter-post' (ṭappā + alya = 'stamping-house')," connecting it radically with ṭāpā 'a coop,' ṭāpnā 'to tap,' 'flatten,' 'beat down,' ṭapak 'a sledge hammer,' ṭīpnā 'to press,' &c. [with which Platts agrees.]
1800.—"The Tappal does not go 30 miles a day."—T. Munro, in Life, i. 244.
1809.—"Requiring only two sets of bearers I knew I might go by tappaul the whole way to Seringapatam."—Ld. Valentia, i. 385.
TAPTEE R., n.p. Tāptī; also called Tāpī, [Skt. Tāpī, 'that which is hot']. The river that runs by the city of Surat.
c. 1630.—"Surat is ... watered with a sweet River named Tappee (or Tindy), as broad as the Thames at Windsor."—Sir T. Herbert, ed. 1638, p. 36.
1813.—"The sacred groves of Pulparra are the general resort for all the Yogees (Jogee), Senassees (Sunyasee), and Hindoo pilgrims ... the whole district is holy, and the Tappee in that part has more than common sanctity."—Forbes, Or. Mem. i. 286; [2nd ed. i. 184, and compare i. 176].
" "Tappee or Tapty."—Ibid. 244; [2nd ed. i. 146].
TARA, TARE, s. The name of a small silver coin current in S. India at the time of the arrival of the Portuguese. It seems to have survived longest in Calicut. The origin we have not traced. It is curious that the commonest silver coin in Sicily down to 1860, and worth about 4½d., was a tarī, generally considered to be a corruption of dirhem. I see Sir Walter Elliot has mooted this very question in his Coins of S. India (p. 138). [The word is certainly Malayāl. tāram, defined in the Madras Gloss. as "a copper coin, value 1½ pies." Mr. Gray in his note to the passage from Pyrard de Laval quoted below, suggests that it took its name from tāra, 'a star.']
1506.—(The Viceroy, D. Francisco D'Almeida, wintering his fleet in Cochin). "As the people were numerous they made quite a big town with a number of houses covered with upper stories of timber, and streets also where the people of the country set up their stalls in which they sold plenty of victuals, and cheap. Thus for a vinten of silver you got in change 20 silver coins that they called taras, something like the scale of a sardine, and for such coin they gave you 12 or 15 figs, or 4 or 5 eggs, and for a single vintem 3 or 4 fowls, and for one tara fish enough to fill two men's bellies, or rice enough for a day's victuals, dinner and supper too. Bread there was none, for there was no wheat except in the territory of the Moors."—Correa, i. 624.
1510.—The King of Narsinga (or Vijayanagar) "coins a silver money called tare, and others of gold, twenty of which go to a pardao, and are called fanom. And of these small ones of silver, there go 16 to a fanom."—Varthema, 130.
[c. 1610.—"Each man receives four tarents, which are small silver coins, each of the value of one-sixteenth of a larin."—Pyrard de Laval, Hak. Soc. i. 344. Later on (i. 412) he says "16 tarens go to a Phanan"].
1673.—(at Calicut). "Their coin admits no Copper; Silver Tarrs, 28 of which make a Fanam, passing instead thereof."—Fryer, 55.
" "Calicut.
* * * * *
"Tarrs are the peculiar Coin, the rest are common to India."—Ibid. 207.
1727.—"Calecut ... coins are 10 Tar to a Fanam, 4½ Fanams to a Rupee."—A. Hamilton, ii. 316; [ed. 1744].
[1737.—"We are to allow each man 4 measures of rice and 1 tar per diem."—Agreement in Logan, Malabar, iii. 95, and see "tarrs" in iii. 192. Mr. Logan (vol. iii. Gloss. s.v.) defines the tara as equal to 2 pies.]
TARE AND TRET. Whence comes this odd firm in the books of arithmetic? Both partners apparently through Italy. The first Fr. tare, It. tara, from Ar. ṭaraḥa, 'to reject,' as pointed out by Dozy. Tret is alleged to be from It. tritare, 'to crumble or grind,' perhaps rather from trito, 'ground or triturated.' [Prof. Skeat (Concise Dict. s.v.) derives it from Fr. traite, 'a draught,' and that from Lat. tractus, trahere, 'to draw.']
TAREGA, s. This represents a word for a broker (or person analogous to the hong merchants of Canton in former days) in Pegu, in the days of its prosperity. The word is from S. India. We have in Tel. taraga, 'the occupation of a broker'; Tam. taragari, 'a broker.'
1583.—"... e se fosse alcuno che a tempo del pagamento per non pagar si absentasse dalla città, o si ascondesse, il Tarrecà e obligato pagar per lui ... i Tarrecà cosi si demandano i sensari."—G. Balbi, f. 107v, 108.
1587.—"There are in Pegu eight Brokers, whom they call Tareghe, which are bound to sell your goods at the price they be Woorth, and you give them for their labour two in the hundred: and they be bound to make your debt good, because you sell your marchandises vpon their word."—R. Fitch, in Hakl. ii. 393.
TARIFF, s. This comes from Ar. ta'rīf, ta'rīfa, 'the making known.' Dozy states that it appears to be comparatively modern in Spanish and Port., and has come into Europe apparently through Italian.
TAROUK, TAROUP, n.p. Burm. Tarūk, Tarūp. This is the name given by the Burmese to the Chinese. Thus a point a little above the Delta of the Irawadi, where the invading army of Kublai Khan (c. 1285) is said to have turned back, is called Tarūk-mau, or Chinese Point. But the use of this name, according to Sir A. Phayre, dates only from the Middle Ages, and the invasion just mentioned. Before that the Chinese, as we understand him, are properly termed Tsin; though the coupled names Tarūk and Taret, which are applied in the chronicles to early invaders, "may be considered as designations incorrectly applied by later copyists." And Sir A. Phayre thinks Tarūk is a form of Tūrk, whilst Taret is now applied to the Manchus. It seems to us probable that Taruk and Taret are probably meant for 'Turk and Tartar' (see H. of Burma, pp. 8, 11, 56). [Mr. Scott (Upper Burma Gazetteer, i. pt. i. 193) suggests a connection with the Teru or Tero State, which developed about the 11th century, the race having been expelled from China in 778 A.D.]
TASHREEF, s. This is the Ar. tashrīf, 'honouring'; and thus "conferring honour upon anyone, as by paying him a visit, presenting a dress of honour, or any complimentary donation" (Wilson). In Northern India the general use of the word is as one of ceremonious politeness in speaking of a visit from a superior or from one who is treated in politeness as a superior; when such an one is invited to 'bring his tashrīf,' i.e. 'to carry the honour of his presence,' 'to condescend to visit '——. The word always implies superiority on the part of him to whom tashrīf is attributed. It is constantly used by polite natives in addressing Europeans. But when the European in return says (as we have heard said, through ignorance of the real meaning of the phrase), 'I will bring my tashrīf,' the effect is ludicrous in the extreme, though no native will betray his amusement. In S. India the word seems to be used for the dress of honour conferred, and in the old Madras records, rightly or wrongly, for any complimentary present, in fact a honorarium. Thus in Wheeler we find the following:
1680.—"It being necessary to appoint one as the Company's Chief Merchant (Verona being deceased), resolved Bera Pedda Vincatadry, do succeed and the Tasheriffs be given to him and the rest of the principal Merchants, viz., 3 yards Scarlett to Pedda Vincatadry, and 2½ yards each to four others....
"The Governor being informed that Verona's young daughter was melancholly and would not eat because her husband had received no Tasheriff, he also is Tasherifd with 2½ yards Scarlet cloth."—Fort St. Geo. Consns., April 6. In Notes and Exts., Madras, 1873, p. 15.
1685.—"Gopall Pundit having been at great charge in coming hither with such a numerous retinue ... that we may engage him ... to continue his friendship, to attain some more and better privileges there (at Cuddalore) than we have as yet—It is ordered that he with his attendants be Tasherift as followeth" (a list of presents follows).—In Wheeler, i. 148. [And see the same phrase in Pringle, Diary, &c., i. 1].
TATTOO, and abbreviated, TAT, s. A native-bred pony. Hind. ṭaṭṭū, [which Platts connects with Skt. tara, 'passing over'].
1784.—"On their arrival at the Choultry they found a miserable dooley and 15 tattoo horses."—In Seton-Karr, i. 15.
1785.—"We also direct that strict injunctions be given to the baggage department, for sending all the lean Tatoos, bullocks, &c., to grass, the rainy season being now at hand."—Tippoo's Letters, 105.
1804.—"They can be got for 25 rupees each horseman upon an average; but, I believe, when they receive only this sum they muster tattoos.... From 30 to 35 rupees each horse is the sum paid to the best horsemen."—Wellington, iii. 174.
1808.—"These tut,hoos are a breed of small ponies, and are the most useful and hardy little animals in India."—Broughton's Letters, 156; [ed. 1892, 117].
1810.—"Every servant ... goes share in some tattoo ... which conveys his luggage."—Williamson, V.M. i. 311.
1824.—"Tattoos. These are a kind of small, cat-hammed, and ill-looking ponies; but they are hardy and walk faster than oxen."—Seely, Wonders of Ellora, ch. ii.
1826.—"... when I mounted on my tattoo, or pony, I could at any time have commanded the attendance of a dozen grooms, so many pressed forward to offer me their services."—Pandurang Hari, 21; [ed. 1873, i. 28].
[1830.—"Mounting our tats, we were on the point of proceeding homewards...."—Oriental Sport. Mag., ed. 1873, i. 437.]
c. 1831.—"... mon tattou est fort au dessous de la taille d'un arabe...."—Jacquemont, Corresp. i. 347.
c. 1840.
"With its bright brass patent axles, and its little hog-maned tatts,
And its ever jetty harness, which was always made by Watts...."
A few lines in honour of the late Mr. Simms,
in Parker's Bole Ponjis, 1851, ii. 215.
1853.—"... Smith's plucky proposal to run his notable tat, Pickles."—Oakfield, i. 94.
1875.—"You young Gentlemen rode over on your tats, I suppose? The Subaltern's tat—that is the name, you know, they give to a pony in this country—is the most useful animal you can imagine."—The Dilemma, ch. ii.
TATTY, s. Hind. ṭaṭṭī and ṭaṭi, [which Platts connects with Skt. tantra, 'a thread, the warp in a loom']. A screen or mat made of the roots of fragrant grass (see CUSCUS) with which door or window openings are filled up in the season of hot winds. The screens being kept wet, their fragrant evaporation as the dry winds blow upon them cools and refreshes the house greatly, but they are only efficient when such winds are blowing. See also THERMANTIDOTE. The principle of the tatty is involved in the quotation from Dr. Fryer, though he does not mention the grass-mats.
1673.—"They keep close all day for 3 or 4 Months together ... repelling the Heat by a coarse wet Cloath, continually hanging before the chamber-windows."—Fryer, 47.
[1789.—The introduction of tatties into Calcutta is mentioned in a letter from Dr. Campbell, dated May 10, 1789:—"We have had very hot winds and delightful cool houses. Everybody uses tatties now.... Tatties are however dangerous when you are obliged to leave them and go abroad, the heat acts so powerfully on the body that you are commonly affected with a severe catarrh."—In Carey, Good Old Days, i. 80.]
1808.—"... now, when the hot winds have set in, and we are obliged to make use of tattees, a kind of screens made of the roots of a coarse grass called Kus."—Broughton's Letters, 110; [ed. 1892, p. 83].
1809.—"Our style of architecture is by no means adapted to the climate, and the large windows would be insufferable, were it not for the tattyes which are easily applied to a house one story high."—Ld. Valentia, i. 104.
1810.—"During the hot winds tats (a kind of mat), made of the root of the koosa grass, which has an agreeable smell, are placed against the doors and windows."—Maria Graham, 125.
1814.—"Under the roof, throughout all the apartments, are iron rings, from which the tattees or screens of sweet scented grass, were suspended."—Forbes, Or. Mem. iv. 6; [2nd ed. ii. 392].
1828.—"An early breakfast was over; the well watered tatties were applied to the windows, and diffused through the apartment a cool and refreshing atmosphere which was most comfortably contrasted with the white heat and roar of the fierce wind without."—The Kuzzilbash, I. ii.
TAUT, s. Hind. ṭāṭ, [Skt. trātra, 'defence,' or tantrī, 'made of threads']. Sackcloth.
TAVOY, n.p. A town and district of what we call the Tenasserim Province of B. Burma. The Burmese call it Dha-wé; but our name is probably adopted from a Malay form. The original name is supposed to be Siamese. [The Burmah Gazetteer (ii. 681) gives the choice of three etymologies: 'landing place of bamboos'; from its arms (dha, 'a sword,' way, 'to buy'); from Hta-way, taken from a cross-legged Buddha.]
1583.—"Also some of the rich people in a place subject to the Kingdom of Pegu, called Tavae, where is produced a quantity of what they call in their language Calain, but which in our language is called Calaia (see CALAY), in summer leave their houses and go into the country, where they make some sheds to cover them, and there they stop three months, leaving their usual dwellings with food in them for the devil, and this they do in order that in the other nine months he may give them no trouble, but rather be propitious and favourable to them."—G. Balbi, f. 125.
1587.—"... Iland of Tavi, from which cometh great store of Tinne which serveth all India."—R. Fitch, in Hakl. ii. 395.
1695.—"10th. That your Majesty, of your wonted favour and charity to all distresses, would be pleased to look with Eyes of Pity, upon the poor English Captive, Thomas Browne, who is the only one surviving of four that were accidentally drove into Tauwy by Storm, as they were going for Atcheen about 10 years ago, in the service of the English Company."—Petition to the King of Burma, presented at Ava by Edward Fleetwood, in Dalrymple, Or. Repert. ii. 374.
[TAWEEZ, s. Ar. ta'wīẓ, lit. 'praying for protection by invoking God, or by uttering a charm'; then 'an amulet or phylactery'; and, as in the quotation from Herklots, 'a structure of brick or stone-work over a tomb.'
[1826.—
"Let her who doth this Taweey wear,
Guard against the Gossein's snare."
Pandurang Hari, ed. 1873, i. 148.
[TAZEE, s. Pers. tāzī, 'invading, invader,' from tāz, 'running.' A favourite variety of horse, usually of Indian breed. The word is also used of a variety of greyhound.
[1839.—"A good breed of the Indian kind, called Tauzee, is also found in Bunnoo and Damaun...."—Elphinstone, Caubul, ed. 1842, i. 189.
[1883.—"The 'Tazzies,' or greyhounds are not looked upon as unclean...."—Wills, Modern Persia, ed. 1891, p. 306.]
TAZEEA, n. A.—P.—H. ta'ziya, 'mourning for the dead.' In India the word is applied to the taboot, or representations, in flimsy material, of the tombs of Hussein and Hassan which are carried about in the Muḥarram (see MOHURRUM) processions. In Persia it seems to be applied to the whole of the mystery-play which is presented at that season. At the close of the procession the ta'ziyas must be thrown into water; if there be no sufficient mass of water they should be buried. [See Sir L. Pelly, The Miracle Play of Hasan and Husain.] The word has been carried to the W. Indies by the coolies, whose great festival (whether they be Mahommedans or Hindus) the Muḥarram has become. And the attempt to carry the Tazeeas through one of the towns of Trinidad, in spite of orders to the contrary, led in the end of 1884 to a sad catastrophe. [Mahommedan Lascars have an annual celebration at the London Docks.]
TEA, s. Crawfurd alleges that we got this word in its various European forms from the Malay Te, the Chinese name being Chhâ. The latter is indeed the pronunciation attached, when reading in the 'mandarin dialect,' to the character representing the tea-plant, and is the form which has accompanied the knowledge of tea to India, Persia, Portugal, Greece (τσάι) and Russia. But though it may be probable that Te, like several other names of articles of trade, may have come to us through the Malay, the word is, not the less, originally Chinese, Tê (or Tay as Medhurst writes it) being the utterance attached to the character in the Fuh-kien dialect. The original pronunciation, whether direct from Fuh-kien or through the Malay, accompanied the introduction of tea to England as well as other countries of Western Europe. This is shown by several couplets in Pope, e.g.
"... There stands a structure of majestic frame
Which from the neighbouring Hampton takes its name.
* * * * *
Here thou, great Anna, whom three Realms obey,
Dost sometimes counsel take, and sometimes tea."
Rape of the Lock, iii.
Here tay was evidently the pronunciation, as in Fuh-kien. The Rape of the Lock was published in 1711. In Gray's Trivia, published in 1720, we find tea rhyme to pay, in a passage needless to quote (ii. 296). Fifty years later there seems no room for doubt that the pronunciation had changed to that now in use, as is shown by Johnson's extemporised verses (c. 1770):
"I therefore pray thee, Renny, dear,
That thou wilt give to me
With cream and sugar soften'd well,
Another dish of tea"—and so on.
Johnsoniana, ed. Boswell, 1835, ix. 194.
The change must have taken place between 1720 and 1750, for about the latter date we find in the verses of Edward Moore:
"One day in July last at tea,
And in the house of Mrs. P."
The Trial of Sarah, &c.
[But the two forms of pronunciation seem to have been in use earlier, as appears from the following advertisement in The Gazette of Sept. 9, 1658 (quoted in 8 ser. N. & Q. vi. 266): "That excellent, and by all Physitians approved, China Drink, called by the Chineans Toha, by other nations Tay, alias Tee, is sold at the Sultaness Head, a coffee house in Sweetings Rents by the Royal Exchange, London."] And in Zedler's Lexicon (1745) it is stated that the English write the word either Tee or Tea, but pronounce it Tiy, which seems to represent our modern pronunciation. ["Strange to say, the Italians, however, have two names for tea, cia and te, the latter, of course, is from the Chinese word te, noticed above, while the former is derived from the word ch'a. It is curious to note in this connection that an early mention, if not the first notice, of the word in English is under the form cha (in an English Glossary of A.D. 1671); we are also told that it was once spelt tcha—both evidently derived from the Cantonese form of the word: but 13 years later we have the word derived from the Fokienese te, but borrowed through the French and spelt as in the latter language the; the next change in the word is early in the following century when it drops the French spelling and adopts the present form of tea, though the Fokienese pronunciation, which the French still retain, is not dropped for the modern pronunciation of the now wholly Anglicised word tea till comparatively lately. It will thus be seen that we, like the Italians, might have had two forms of the word, had we not discarded the first, which seemed to have made but little lodgement with us, for the second" (Ball, Things Chinese, 3rd ed. 583 seq.).]
Dr. Bretschneider states that the Tea-shrub is mentioned in the ancient Dictionary Rh-ya, which is believed to date long before our era, under the names Kia and K'u-tu (K'u = 'bitter'), and a commentator on this work who wrote in the 4th century A.D. describes it, adding "From the leaves can be made by boiling a hot beverage" (On Chinese Botanical Works, &c., p. 13). But the first distinct mention of tea-cultivation in Chinese history is said to be a record in the annals of the T'ang Dynasty under A.D. 793, which mentions the imposition in that year of a duty upon tea. And the first western mention of it occurs in the next century, in the notes of the Arab traders, which speak not only of tea, but of this fact of its being subject to a royal impost. Tea does not appear to be mentioned by the medieval Arab writers upon Materia Medica, nor (strange to say) do any of the European travellers to Cathay in the 13th and 14th centuries make mention of it. Nor is there any mention of it in the curious and interesting narrative of the Embassy sent by Shāh Rukh, the son of the great Timur, to China (1419-21).[3] The first European work, so far as we are aware, in which tea is named, is Ramusio's (posthumous) Introduction to Marco Polo, in the second volume of his great collection of Navigationi e Viaggi. In this he repeats the account of Cathay which he had heard from Hajji Mahommed, a Persian merchant who visited Venice. Among other matters the Hajji detailed the excellent properties of Chiai-Catai (i.e. Pers. Chā-i-Khitāī, 'Tea of China'), concluding with an assurance that if these were known in Persia and in Europe, traders would cease to purchase rhubarb, and would purchase this herb instead, a prophecy which has been very substantially verified. We find no mention of tea in the elaborate work of Mendoça on China. The earliest notices of which we are aware will be found below. Milburn gives some curious extracts from the E.I. Co.'s records as to the early importation of tea into England. Thus, 1666, June 30, among certain "raretys," chiefly the production of China, provided by the Secretary of the Company for His Majesty, appear:
| "22¾ lbs. of thea at 50s. per lb. | = £56 17 6 |
| For the two cheefe persons that attended his Majesty, thea |
6 15 6" |
In 1667 the E.I. Co.'s first order for the importation of tea was issued to their agent at Bantam: "to send home by these ships 100lb. weight of the best tey that you can get." The first importation actually made for the Co. was in 1669, when two canisters were received from Bantam, weighing 143½ lbs. (Milburn, ii. 531.) [The earliest mention of tea in the Old Records of the India Office is in a letter from Mr. R. Wickham, the Company's Agent at Firando, in Japan, who, writing, June 27, 1615, to Mr. Eaton at Miaco, asks for "a pt. of the best sort of chaw" (see Birdwood, Report on Old Records, 26, where the early references are collected).]
c. 1545.—"Moreover, seeing the great delight that I above the rest of the party took in this discourse of his, he (Chaggi Memet, i.e. Hajji Mahommed) told me that all over the country of Cathay they make use of another plant, that is of its leaves, which is called by those people Chiai Catai: it is produced in that district of Cathay which is called Cachan-fu. It is a thing generally used and highly esteemed in all those regions. They take this plant whether dry or fresh, and boil it well in water, and of this decoction they take one or two cups on an empty stomach; it removes fever, headache, stomach-ache, pain in the side or joints; taking care to drink it as hot as you can bear; it is good also for many other ailments which I can't now remember, but I know gout was one of them. And if any one chance to feel his stomach oppressed by overmuch food, if he will take a little of this decoction he will in a short time have digested it. And thus it is so precious and highly esteemed that every one going on a journey takes it with him, and judging from what he said these people would at any time gladly swap a sack of rhubarb for an ounce of Chiai Catai. These people of Cathay say (he told us) that if in our country, and in Persia, and the land of the Franks, it was known, merchants would no longer invest their money in Rauend Chini as they call rhubarb."—Ramusio, Dichiaratione, in ii. f. 15.
c. 1560.—"Whatsoever person or persones come to any mans house of qualitee, hee hath a custome to offer him in a fine basket one Porcelane ... with a kinde of drinke which they call cha, which is somewhat bitter, red, and medicinall, which they are wont to make with a certayne concoction of herbes."—Da Cruz, in Purchas, iii. 180.
1565.—"Ritus est Japoniorum ... benevolentiae causâ praebere spectanda, quae apud se pretiosissima sunt, id est, omne instrumentum necessarium ad potionem herbae cujusdam in pulverem redactae, suavem gustu, nomine Chia. Est autem modus potionis ejusmodi: pulveris ejus, quantum uno juglandis putamine continetur, conjiciunt in fictile vas ex eorum genere, quae procellana (Porcelain) vulgus appellat. Inde calenti admodum aquâ dilutum ebibunt. Habent autem in eos usus ollam antiquissimi operis ferream, figlinum poculum, cochlearia, infundibulum eluendo figlino, tripodem, foculum denique potioni caleficiendae."—Letter from Japan, of L. Almeida, in Maffei, Litt. Select. ex India, Lib. iv.
1588.—"Caeterum (apud Chinenses) ex herba quadam expressus liquor admodum salutaris, nomine Chia, calidus hauritur, ut apud Iaponios."—Maffei, Hist. Ind. vi.
" "Usum vitis ignorant (Japonii): oryzâ exprimunt vinum: Sed ipsi quoque ante omnia delectantur haustibus aquae poene ferventis, insperso quem supra diximus pulvere Chia. Circa eam potionem diligentissimi sunt, ac principes interdum viri suis ipsi manibus eidem temperandae ac miscendae, amicorum honoris causae, dant operam."—Ibid. Lib. xii.
1598.—"... the aforesaid warme water is made with the powder of a certaine hearbe called chaa."—Linschoten, 46; [Hak. Soc. i. 157].
1611.—"Of the same fashion is the cha of China, and taken in the same manner; except that the Cha is the small leaf of a herb, from a certain plant brought from Tartary, which was shown me when I was at Malaca."—Teixeira, i. 19.
1616.—"I bought 3 chaw cups covered with silver plates...."—Cocks, Diary, Hak. Soc. i. 202, [and see ii. 11].
1626.—"They vse much the powder of a certaine Herbe called Chia, of which they put as much as a Walnut-shell may containe, into a dish of Porcelane, and drinke it with hot water."—Purchas, Pilgrimage, 587.
1631.—"Dur. You have mentioned the drink of the Chinese called Thee; what is your opinion thereof?... Bont. ... The Chinese regard this beverage almost as something sacred ... and they are not thought to have fulfilled the rites of hospitality to you until they have served you with it, just like the Mahometans with their Caveah (see COFFEE). It is of a drying quality, and banishes sleep ... it is beneficial to asthmatic and wheezing patients."—Jac. Bontius, Hist. Nat. et Med. Ind. Or. Lib. i. Dial. vi. p. 11.
1638.—"Dans les assemblées ordinaires (à Sourat) que nous faisions tous les iours, nous ne prenions que du Thè, dont l'vsage est fort cummun par toutes les Indes."—Mandelslo, ed. Paris, 1659, p. 113.
1658.—"Non mirum est, multos etiam nunc in illo errore versari, quasi diversae speciei plantae essent The et Tsia, cum è contra eadem sit, cujus decoctum Chinensibus The, Iaponensibus Tsia nomen audiat; licet horum Tsia, ob magnam contributionem et coctionem, nigrum The appellatur."—Bontii Hist. Nat. Pisonis Annot. p. 87.
1660.—(September) "28th.... I did send for a cup of tea (a China drink) of which I never had drank before."—Pepys's Diary. [Both Ld. Braybrooke (4th ed. i. 110) and Wheatley (i. 249) read tee, and give the date as Sept. 25.]
1667.—(June) "28th.... Home and there find my wife making of tea; a drink which Mr. Pelling, the Potticary, tells her is good for her cold and defluxions."—Ibid. [Wheatley, vi. 398].
1672.—"There is among our people, and particularly among the womankind a great abuse of Thee, not only that too much is drunk ... but this is also an evil custom to drink it with a full stomach; it is better and more wholesome to make use of it when the process of digestion is pretty well finished.... It is also a great folly to use sugar candy with Thee."—Baldaeus, Germ. ed. 179. (This author devotes five columns to tea, and its use and abuse in India).
1677.—"Planta dicitur Chà, vel ... Cià, ... cujus usus in Chinae claustris nescius in Europae quoque paulatim sese insinuare attentat.... Et quamvis Turcarum Cave (see COFFEE) et Mexicanorum Ciocolata eundem praestent effectum, Cià tamen, quam nonulli quoque Te vocant, ea multum superat," etc.—Kircher, China Illust. 180.
" "Maer de Ciâ (of Thee) sonder achting op eenije tijt te hebben, is novit schadelijk."—Vermeulen, 30.
1683.—"Lord Russell ... went into his chamber six or seven times in the morning, and prayed by himself, and then came out to Tillotson and me; he drunk a little tea and some sherry."—Burnet, Hist. of Own Time, Oxford ed. 1823, ii. 375.
1683.—
"Venus her Myrtle, Phœbus has his Bays;
Tea both excels which She[4] vouchsafes to praise,
The best of Queens, and best of Herbs we owe
To that bold Nation which the Way did show
To the fair Region where the Sun does rise,
Whose rich Productions we so justly prize."—Waller.
1690.—"... Of all the followers of Mahomet ... none are so rigidly Abstemious as the Arabians of Muscatt.... For Tea and Coffee, which are judg'd the privileg'd Liquors of all the Mahometans, as well as Turks, as those of Persia, India, and other parts of Arabia, are condemned by them as unlawful...."—Ovington, 427.
1726.—"I remember well how in 1681 I for the first time in my life drank thee at the house of an Indian Chaplain, and how I could not understand how sensible men could think it a treat to drink what tasted no better than hay-water."—Valentijn, v. 190.
1789.—
"And now her vase a modest Naiad fills
With liquid crystal from her pebbly rills;
Piles the dry cedar round her silver urn,
(Bright climbs the blaze, the crackling faggots burn).
Culls the green herb of China's envy'd bowers,
In gaudy cups the steaming treasure pours;
And sweetly smiling, on her bended knee,
Presents the fragrant quintessence of Tea."
Darwin, Botanic Garden, Loves of the Plants, Canto ii.
The following are some of the names given in the market to different kinds of tea, with their etymologies.
1. (TEA), BOHEA. This name is from the Wu-i (dialectically Bú-î)-shan Mountains in the N.W. of Fuh-kien, one of the districts most famous for its black tea. In Pope's verse, as Crawfurd points out, Bohea stands for a tea in use among fashionable people. Thus:
"To part her time 'twixt reading and bohea,
To muse, and spill her solitary tea."
Epistle to Mrs Teresa Blount.
[The earliest examples in the N.E.D. carry back the use of the word to the first years of the 18th century.]
1711.—
"Oh had I rather unadmired remained
On some lone isle or distant northern land;
Where the gilt chariot never marks the way,
Where none learn ombre, none e'er taste bohea."
Belinda, in Rape of the Lock, iv. 153.
The last quotation, and indeed the first also, shows that the word was then pronounced Bohay. At a later date Bohea sank to be the market name of one of the lowest qualities of tea, and we believe it has ceased altogether to be a name quoted in the tea-market. The following quotations seem to show that it was the general name for "black-tea."
1721.—
"Where Indus and the double Ganges flow,
On odorif'rous plains the leaves do grow,
Chief of the treat, a plant the boast of fame,
Sometimes called green, Bohea's the greater name."
Allan Ramsay's Poems, ed. 1800, i. 213-14.
1726.—"Anno 1670 and 1680 there was knowledge only of Boey Tea and Green Tea, but later they speak of a variety of other sorts ... Congo ... Pego ... Tongge, Rosmaryn Tea, rare and very dear."—Valentijn, iv. 14.
1727.—"In September they strip the Bush of all its Leaves, and, for Want of warm dry Winds to cure it, are forced to lay it on warm Plates of Iron or Copper, and keep it stirring gently, till it is dry, and that Sort is called Bohea."—A. Hamilton, ii. 289; [ed. 1744, ii. 288].But Zedler's Lexicon (1745) in a long article on Thee gives Thee Bohea as "the worst sort of all." The other European trade-names, according to Zedler, were Thee-Peco, Congo which the Dutch called the best, but Thee Cancho was better still and dearer, and Chaucon best of all.
2. (TEA) CAMPOY, a black tea also. Kam-pui, the Canton pron. of the characters Kien-pei, "select-dry (over a fire)."
3. (TEA) CONGOU (a black tea). This is Kang-hu (tê) the Amoy pronunciation of the characters Kung-fu, 'work or labour.' [Mr. Pratt (9 ser. N. & Q. iv. 26) writes: "The N.E.D. under Congou derives it from the standard Chinese Kung-fu (which happens also to be the Cantonese spelling); 'the omission of the f,' we are told, 'is the foreigner's corruption.' It is nothing of the kind. The Amoy name for this tea is Kong-hu, so that the omission of the f is due to the local Chinese dialect."]
4. HYSON (a green tea). This is He- (hei and ai in the south) -ch'un, 'bright spring,' [which Mr. Ball (Things Chinese, 586) writes yu-ts'in, 'before the rain'], characters which some say formed the hong name of a tea-merchant named Le, who was in the trade in the dist. of Hiu-ning (S.W. of Hang-chau) about 1700; others say that He-chun was Le's daughter, who was the first to separate the leaves, so as to make what is called Hyson. [Mr. Ball says that it is so called, "the young hyson being half-opened leaves plucked in April before the spring rains."]
"And Venus, goddess of the eternal smile,
Knowing that stormy brows but ill become
Fair patterns of her beauty, hath ordained
Celestial Tea;—a fountain that can cure
The ills of passion, and can free from frowns.
* * * * *
To her, ye fair! in adoration bow!
Whether at blushing morn, or dewy eve,
Her smoking cordials greet your fragrant board
With Hyson, or Bohea, or Congo crown'd."
R. Fergusson, Poems.
5. OOLONG (bl. tea). Wu-lung, 'black dragon'; respecting which there is a legend to account for the name. ["A black snake (and snakes are sometimes looked upon as dragons in China) was coiled round a plant of this tea, and hence the name" (Ball, op. cit. 586).]
6. PEKOE (do.). Pak-ho, Canton pron. of characters pŏh-hao, 'white-down.'
7. POUCHONG (do.). Pao-chung, 'fold-sort.' So called from its being packed in small paper packets, each of which is supposed to be the produce of one choice tea-plant. Also called Padre-souchong, because the priests in the Wu-i hills and other places prepare and pack it.
8. SOUCHONG (do.). Siu-chung, Canton for Siao-chung, 'little-sort.'
9. TWANKAY (green tea). From T'un-k'i, the name of a mart about 15 m. S.W. of Hwei-chau-fu in Ngan-hwei. Bp. Moule says (perhaps after W. Williams?) from T'un-k'i, name of a stream near Yen-shau-fu in Chi-kiang. [Mr. Pratt (loc. cit.) writes; "The Amoy Tun-ke is nearer, and the Cantonese Tun-kei nearer still, its second syllable being absolutely the same in sound as the English. The Twankay is a stream in the E. of the province of Nganhwui, where Twankay tea grows."] Twankay is used by Theodore Hook as a sort of slang for 'tea.'
10. YOUNG HYSON. This is called by the Chinese Yü-t'sien, 'rain-before,' or 'Yu-before,' because picked before Kuh-yu, a term falling about 20th April (see HYSON above). According to Giles it was formerly called, in trade, Uchain, which seems to represent the Chinese name. In an "Account of the Prices at which Teas have been put up to Sale, that arrived in England in 1784, 1785" (MS. India Office Records) the Teas are (from cheaper to dearer):—
"Bohea Tea,
Congou,
Souchong,
Singlo (?),
Hyson."
TEA-CADDY, s. This name, in common English use for a box to contain tea for the daily expenditure of the household, is probably corrupted, as Crawfurd suggests, from catty, a weight of 1⅓ lb. (q.v.). A 'catty-box,' meaning a box holding a catty, might easily serve this purpose and lead to the name. This view is corroborated by a quotation which we have given under caddy (q.v.) A friend adds the remark that in his youth 'Tea-caddy' was a Londoner's name for Harley Street, due to the number of E.I. Directors and proprietors supposed to inhabit that district.
TEAPOY, s. A small tripod table. This word is often in England imagined to have some connection with tea, and hence, in London shops for japanned ware and the like, a teapoy means a tea-chest fixed on legs. But this is quite erroneous. Tipāī is a Hindustāni, or perhaps rather an Anglo-Hindustāni word for a tripod, from Hind. tīn, 3, and Pers. pāē, 'foot.' The legitimate word from the Persian is sipāī (properly sihpāya), and the legitimate Hindi word tirpad or tripad, but tipāī or tepoy was probably originated by some European in analogy with the familiar charpoy (q.v.) or 'four-legs,' possibly from inaccuracy, possibly from the desire to avoid confusion with another very familiar word sepoy, seapoy. [Platts, however, gives tipāī as a regular Hind. word, Skt. tri-pād-ikā.] The word is applied in India not only to a three-legged table (or any very small table, whatever number of legs it has), but to any tripod, as to the tripod-stands of surveying instruments, or to trestles in carpentry. Sihpāya occurs in 'Ali of Yezd's history of Timur, as applied to the trestles used by Timur in bridging over the Indus (Elliot, iii. 482). A teapoy is called in Chinese by a name having reference to tea: viz. Ch'a-chi'rh. It has 4 legs.
1844.—"'Well, to be sure, it does seem odd—very odd;'—and the old gentleman chuckled,—'most odd to find a person who don't know what a tepoy is.... Well, then, a tepoy or tinpoy is a thing with three feet, used in India to denote a little table, such as that just at your right.'
"'Why, that table has four legs,' cried Peregrine.
"'It's a tepoy all the same,' said Mr. Havethelacks."—Peregrine Pulteney, i. 112.
TEAK, s. The tree, and timber of the tree, known to botanists as Tectona grandis, L., N.O. Verbenaceae. The word is Malayāl. tekka, Tam. tekku. No doubt this name was adopted owing to the fact that Europeans first became acquainted with the wood in Malabar, which is still one of the two great sources of supply; Pegu being the other. The Skt. name of the tree is śāka, whence the modern Hind. name sāgwān or sāgūn and the Mahr. śāg. From this last probably was taken sāj, the name of teak in Arabic and Persian. And we have doubtless the same word in the σαγαλίνα of the Periplus, one of the exports from Western India, a form which may be illustrated by the Mahr. adj. sāgalī, 'made of the teak, belonging to teak.' The last fact shows, in some degree, how old the export of teak is from India. Teak beams, still undecayed, exist in the walls of the great palace of the Sassanid Kings at Seleucia or Ctesiphon, dating from the middle of the 6th century. [See Birdwood, First Letter Book, Intro. XXIX.] Teak has continued to recent times to be imported into Egypt. See Forskal, quoted by Royle (Hindu Medicine, 128). The gopher-wood of Genesis is translated sāj in the Arabic version of the Pentateuch (Royle). [It was probably cedar (see Encycl. Bibl. s.v.)]
Teak seems to have been hardly known in Gangetic India in former days. We can find no mention of it in Baber (which however is indexless), and the only mention we can find in the Āīn, is in a list of the weights of a cubic yard of 72 kinds of wood, where the name "Ságaun" has not been recognised as teak by the learned translator (see Blochmann's E.T. i. p. 228).
"Sailing past the mouth of the Gulf, after a course of 6 days you reach another port of Persia called Omana. Thither they are wont to despatch from Barygaza, to both these ports of Persia, great vessels with brass, and timbers and beams of teak (ζύλων σαγαλίνων καὶ δοκῶν), and horns and spars of shisham (see SISSOO) (σασαμίνων), and of ebony...."—Peripl. Maris Erythr. § 35-36.
c. 800.—(under Hārūn al Rashīd) "Faẓl continued his story '... I heard loud wailing from the house of Abdallah ... they told me he had been struck with the judām, that his body was swollen and all black.... I went to Rashīd to tell him, but I had not finished when they came to say Abdallah was dead. Going out at once I ordered them to hasten the obsequies.... I myself said the funeral prayer. As they let down the bier a slip took place, and the bier and earth fell in together; an intolerable stench arose ... a second slip took place. I then called for planks of teak (sāj)...."—Quotation in Maṣ'ūdī, Prairies d'Or, vi. 298-299.
c. 880.—"From Kol to Sindān, where they collect teak-wood (sāj) and cane, 18 farsakhs."—Ibn Khurdādba, in J. As. S. VI. tom. v. 284.
c. 940.—"... The teak-tree (sāj). This tree, which is taller than the date-palm, and more bulky than the walnut, can shelter under its branches a great number of men and cattle, and you may judge of its dimensions by the logs that arrive, of their natural length, at the depôts of Basra, of 'Irāk, and of Egypt...."—Māṣ'ūdī, iii. 12.
Before 1200.—Abu'l-ḍhali' the Sindian, describing the regions of Hind, has these verses:
* * * * *
"By my life! it is a land where, when the rain falls,
Jacinths and pearls spring up for him who wants ornaments.
There too are produced musk and camphor and ambergris and agila,
* * * * *
And ivory there, and teak (al-sāj) and aloeswood and sandal...."
Quoted by Kazwini, in Gildemeister, 217-218.
The following order, in a King's Letter to the Goa Government, no doubt refers to Pegu teak, though not naming the particular timber:
1602.—"... It was necessary in order to appease them, to give a promise in writing that the body should not be removed from the town, but should have public burial in our church in sight of everybody; and with this assurance it was taken in solemn procession and deposited in a box of teak (teca), which is a wood not subject to decay...."—Sousa, Oriente Conquist. (1710), ii. 265.
[" "Of many of the roughest thickets of bamboos and of the largest and best wood in the world, that is teca."—Couto, Dec. VII. Bk. vi. ch. 6. He goes on to explain that all the ships and boats made either by Moors or Gentiles since the Portuguese came to India, were of this wood which came from the inexhaustible forests at the back of Damaun.]
1631.—Bontius gives a tolerable cut of the foliage, &c., of the Teak-tree, but writing in the Archipelago does not use that name, describing it under the title "Quercus Indica, Kiati Malaiis dicta."—Lib. vi. cap. 16. On this Rheede, whose plate of the tree is, as usual, excellent (Hortus Malabaricus, iv. tab. 27), observes justly that the teak has no resemblance to an oak-tree, and also that the Malay name is not Kiati but Jati. Kiati seems to be a mistake of some kind growing out of Kayu-jati, 'Teak-wood.'
1644.—"Hã nestas terras de Damam muyta e boa madeyra de Teca, a milhor de toda a India, e tambem de muyta parte do mundo, porque com ser muy fasil de laurar he perduravel, e particullarmente nam lhe tocando agoa."—Bocarro, MS.
1675.—"At Cock-crow we parted hence and observed that the Sheds here were round thatched and lined with broad Leaves of Teke (the Timber Ships are built with) in Fashion of a Bee-hive."—Fryer, 142.
" "... Teke by the Portuguese, Sogwan by the Moors, is the firmest Wood they have for Building ... in Height the lofty Pine exceeds it not, nor the sturdy Oak in Bulk and Substance.... This Prince of the Indian Forest was not so attractive, though mightily glorious, but that...."—Ibid. 178.
1727.—"Gundavee is next, where good Quantities of Teak Timber are cut, and exported, being of excellent Use in building of Houses or Ships."—A. Hamilton, i. 178; [ed. 1744].
1744.—"Tecka is the name of costly wood which is found in the Kingdom of Martaban in the East Indies, and which never decays."—Zeidler, Univ. Lexicon, s.v.
1759.—"They had endeavoured to burn the Teak Timbers also, but they lying in a swampy place, could not take fire."—Capt. Alves, Report on Loss of Negrais, in Dalrymple, i. 349.
c. 1760.—"As to the wood it is a sort called Teak, to the full as durable as oak."—Grose, i. 108.
1777.—"Experience hath long since shewn, that ships built with oak, and joined together with wooden trunnels, are by no means so well calculated to resist the extremes of heat and damp, in the tropical latitudes of Asia, as the ships which are built in India of tekewood, and bound with iron spikes and bolts."—Price's Tracts, i. 191.
1793.—"The teek forests, from whence the marine yard at Bombay is furnished with that excellent species of ship-timber, lie along the western side of the Gaut mountains ... on the north and north-east of Basseen.... I cannot close this subject without remarking the unpardonable negligence we are guilty of in delaying to build teak ships of war for the service of the Indian seas."—Rennell, Memoir, 3rd ed. 260.
[1800.—"Tayca, Tectona Robusta."—Buchanan, Mysore, i. 26.]
TEE, s. The metallic decoration, generally gilt and hung with tinkling bells, on the top of a dagoba in Indo-Chinese countries, which represents the chatras [chhattras] or umbrellas which in ancient times, as royal emblems, crowned these structures. Burm. h'ti, 'an umbrella.'
1855.—"... gleaming in its white plaster, with numerous pinnacles and tall central spire, we had seen it (Gaudapalen Temple at Pugan) from far down the Irawadi rising like a dim vision of Milan Cathedral.... It is cruciform in plan ... exhibiting a massive basement with porches, and rising above in a pyramidal gradation of terraces, crowned by a spire and htee. The latter has broken from its stays at one side, and now leans over almost horizontally...."—Yule, Mission to Ava, 1858, p. 42.
1876.—"... a feature known to Indian archaeologists as a Tee...."—Fergusson, Ind. and East. Archit. 64.
TEEK, adj. Exact, precise, punctual; also parsimonious, [a meaning which Platts does not record]. Used in N. India. Hind. ṭhīk.
TEERUT, TEERTHA, s. Skt. and Hind. tīrth, tīrtha. A holy place of pilgrimage and of bathing for the good of the soul, such as Hurdwar, or the confluence at Praag (Allahabad).
c. 1790.—"Au temple l'enfant est reçue par les devedaschies (Deva-dasi) des mains de ses parens, et après l'avoir baignée dans le tirtha ou étang du temple, elles lui mettent des vêtemens neufs...."—Haafner, ii. 114.
[1858.—"He then summoned to the place no less than three crores and half, or thirty millions and half of teeruts, or angels (sic) who preside each over his special place of religious worship."—Sleeman, Journey through Oudh, ii. 4.]
TEHR, TAIR, &c., s. The wild goat of the Himālaya; Hemitragus jemlaicus, Jerdon, [Blanford, Mammalia, 509]. In Nepāl it is called jhāral. (See SURROW).
TEJPAT, s. Hind. tejpāt, Skt. teja-patra, 'pungent leaf.' The native name for malabathrum.
(1) TELINGA, n.p. Hind. Tilangā, Skt. Tailanga. One of the people of the country east of the Deccan, and extending to the coast, often called, at least since the Middle Ages, Tiliñgāna or Tilangāna, sometimes Tiling or Tilang. Though it has not, perhaps, been absolutely established that this came from a form Triliñga, the habitual application of Tri-Kaliñga, apparently to the same region which in later days was called Tilinga, and the example of actual use of Triliñga, both by Ptolemy (though he carries us beyond the Ganges) and by a Tibetan author quoted below, do make this a reasonable supposition (see Bp. Caldwell's Dravidian Grammar, 2nd ed. Introd. pp. 30 seqq., and the article KLING in this book).
1309.—"On Saturday the 10th of Sha'bán, the army marched from that spot, in order that the pure tree of Islám might be planted and flourish in the soil of Tilang, and the evil tree which had struck its roots deep, might be torn up by force.... When the blessed canopy had been fixed about a mile from Arangal (Warangal, N.E. of Hyderabad), the tents around the fort were pitched so closely that the head of a needle could not get between them."—Amīr Khusrū, in Elliot, iii. 80.
1321.—"In the year 721 H. the Sultán (Ghiyásu-ddín) sent his eldest son, Ulugh Khán, with a canopy and an army against Arangal and Tilang."—Ziá-uddín Barní, Ibid. 231.
c. 1335.—"For every mile along the road there are three dāwāt (post stations) ... and so the road continues for six months' marching, till one reaches the countries of Tiling and Ma'bar...."—Ibn Batuta, iii. 192.
" In the list of provinces of India under the Sultan of Delhi, given by Shihāb-ud-dīn Dimishkī, we find both Talang and Talanj, probably through some mistake.—Not. et Exts. Pt. 1. 170-171.
c. 1590.—"Ṣūba Berār.... Its length from Batāla (or Patiāla) to Bairāgaṛh is 200 kuroh (or kos); its breadth from Bīdar to Hindia 180. On the east of Bairāgaṛh it marches with Bastar; on the north with Hindia; on the south with Tilingāna; on the west with Mahkarābād...."—Āīn (orig.) i. 476; [ed. Jarrett, ii. 228; and see 230, 237].
1608.—"In the southern lands of India since the day when the Turushkas (Turks, i.e. Mahommedans) conquered Magadha, many abodes of Learning were founded; and though they were inconsiderable, the continuance of instruction and exorcism was without interruption, and the Pandit who was called the Son of Men, dwelt in Kalinga, a part of Trilinga."—Tāranātha's H. of Buddhism (Germ. ed. of Schiefner), p. 264. See also 116, 158, 166.
c. 1614.—"Up to that time none of the zamíndárs of distant lands, such as the Rájá of Tilang, Pegu, and Malabar, had ventured upon disobedience or rebellion."—Firishta, in Elliot, vi. 549.
1793.—"Tellingana, of which Warangoll was the capital, comprehended the tract lying between the Kistnah and Godavery Rivers, and east of Visiapour...."—Rennell's Memoir, 3rd ed. p. [cxi.]
(2) TELINGA, s. This term in the 18th century was frequently used in Bengal as synonymous with sepoy, or a native soldier disciplined and clothed in quasi-European fashion, [and is still commonly used by natives to indicate a sepoy or armed policeman in N. India], no doubt because the first soldiers of that type came to Bengal from what was considered to be the Telinga country, viz. Madras.
c. 1760.—"... Sepoys, sometimes called Tellingas."—Grose, in his Glossary, see vol. I. xiv.
1760.—"300 Telingees are run away, and entered into the Beerboom Rajah's service."—In Long, 235; see also 236, 237, and (1761) p. 258, "Tellingers."
c. 1765.—"Somro's force, which amounted to 15 or 16 field-pieces and 6000 or 7000 of those foot soldiers called Talinghas, and which are armed with flint muskets, and accoutred as well as disciplined in the Frenghi or European manner."—Seir Mutaqherin, iii. 254.
1786.—"... Gardi (see GARDEE), which is now the general name of Sipahies all over India, save Bengal ... where they are stiled Talingas, because the first Sipahees that came in Bengal (and they were imported in 1757 by Colonel Clive) were all Talingas or Telougous born ... speaking hardly any language but their native...."—Note by Tr. of Seir Mutaqherin, ii. 93.
c. 1805.—"The battalions, according to the old mode of France, were called after the names of cities and forts.... The Telingas, composed mostly of Hindoos, from Oude, were disciplined according to the old English exercise of 1780...."—Sketch of the Regular Corps, &c., in Service of Native Princes, by Major Lewis Ferdinand Smith, p. 50.
1827.—"You are a Sahib Angrezie.... I have been a Telinga ... in the Company's service, and have eaten their salt. I will do your errand."—Sir W. Scott, The Surgeon's Daughter, ch. xiii.
1883.—"We have heard from natives whose grandfathers lived in those times, that the Oriental portions of Clive's army were known to the Bengalis of Nuddea as Telingas, because they came, or were supposed to have accompanied him from Telingana or Madras."—Saty. Review, Jan. 29, p. 120.
TELOOGOO, n.p. The first in point of diffusion, and the second in culture and copiousness, of the Dravidian languages of the Indian Peninsula. It is "spoken all along the eastern coast of the Peninsula, from the neighbourhood of Pulicat" (24 m. N. of Madras) "where it supersedes Tamil, to Chicacole, where it begins to yield to the Oriya (see OORIYA), and inland it prevails as far as the eastern boundary of the Marâtha country and Mysore, including within its range the 'Ceded Districts' and Karnûl (see KURNOOL), a considerable part of the territories of the Nizam ... and a portion of the Nâgpûr country and Goṇḍvâna" (Bp. Caldwell's Dravid. Gram. Introd. p. 29). Telugu is the name given to the language of the people themselves (other forms being, according to Bp. Caldwell, Telunga, Telinga, Tailinga, Tenugu, and Tenungu), as the language of Telingāna (see TELINGA (1)). It is this language (as appears in the passage from Fryer) that used to be, perhaps sometimes is, called Gentoo at Madras. [Also see BADEGA.]
TEMBOOL, Betel-leaf. Skt. tāmbūla, adopted in Pers. as tāmbūl, and in Ar. al-tambūl. [It gives its name to the Tambolis or Tamolis, sellers of betel in the N. Indian bazars.]
1498.—"And he held in his left hand a very great cup of gold as high as a half almude pot ... into which he spat a certain herb which the men of this country chew for solace, and which herb they call atambor."—Roteiro de V. da Gama, 59.
1510.—"He also eats certain leaves of herbs, which are like the leaves of the sour orange, called by some tamboli."—Varthema, 110.
1563.—"Only you should know that Avicenna calls the betre (Betel) tembul, which seems a word somewhat corrupted, since everybody pronounces it tambul, and not tembul."—Garcia, f. 37h.
TENASSERIM, n.p. A city and territory on the coast of the Peninsula of Further India. It belonged to the ancient kingdom of Pegu, and fell with that to Ava. When we took from the latter the provinces east and south of the Delta of the Irawadi, after the war of 1824-26, these were officially known as "the Martaban and Tenasserim Province," or often as "the Tenasserim Provinces." We have the name probably from the Malay form Tanasari. We do not know to what language the name originally belongs. The Burmese call it Ta-nen-thā-ri. ["The name Tenasserim (Malay Tanah-sari), 'the land of happiness or delight,' was long ago given by the Malays to the Burma province, which still keeps it, the Burmese corruption being Tanang-sari" (Gray, on Pyrard de Laval, quoted below).]
1442.—"The inhabitants of the shores of the Ocean come thither (to Hormuz) from the countries of Chīn (China), Jāvah, Bangāla, the cities of Zirbād (q.v.), of Tenaseri, of Sokotara, of Shahrinao (see SARNAU), of the Isles of Dīwah Mahal (Maldives)."—Abdur-razzāk, in Not. et Exts. xiv. 429.
1498.—"Tenaçar is peopled by Christians, and the King is also a Christian ... in this land is much brasyll, which makes a fine vermilion, as good as the grain, and it costs here 3 cruzados a bahar, whilst in Quayro (Cairo) it costs 60; also there is here aloes-wood, but not much."—Roteiro de V. da Gama, 110.
1501.—Tanaser appears in the list of places in the East Indies of which Amerigo Vespucci had heard from the Portuguese fleet at C. Verde. Printed in Baldelli Boni's Il Milione, pp. liii. seqq.
1506.—"At Tenazar grows all the verzi (brazil), and it costs 1½ ducats the baar (bahar), equal to 4 kantars. This place, though on the coast, is on the mainland. The King is a Gentile; and thence come pepper, cinnamon, galanga, camphor that is eaten, and camphor that is not eaten.... This is indeed the first mart of spices in India."—Leonardo Ca' Masser, in Archiv. Stor. Ital. p. 28.
1510.—"The city of Tarnassari is situated near the sea, etc."—Varthema, 196. This adventurer's account of Tenasserim is an imposture. He describes it by implication as in India Proper, somewhere to the north of Coromandel.
1516.—"And from the Kingdom of Peigu as far as a city which has a seaport, and is named Tanasery, there are a hundred leagues...."—Barbosa, 188.
1568.—"The Pilot told vs that wee were by his altitude not farre from a citie called Tanasary, in the Kingdom of Pegu."—C. Frederike, in Hakl. ii. 359. See Lancaster.
c. 1590.—"In Kambayat (Cambay) a Nákhuda (Nacoda) gets 800 R.... In Pegu and Dahnasari, he gets half as much again as in Cambay."—Āīn, i. 281.
[1598.—"Betweene two Islandes the coast runneth inwards like a bow, wherein lyeth the towne of Tanassarien."—Linschoten, Hak. Soc. i. 103. In the same page he writes Tanassaria.
[1608.—"The small quantities they have here come from Tannaserye."—Danvers, Letters, i. 22.
[c. 1610.—"Some Indians call it (Ceylon) Tenasirin, signifying land of delights, or earthly paradise."—Pyrard de Laval, ii. 140, with Gray's note (Hak. Soc.) quoted above.]
1727.—"Mr. Samuel White was made Shawbandaar (Shabunder) or Custom-Master at Merjee (Mergui) and Tanacerin, and Captain Williams was Admiral of the King's Navy."—A. Hamilton, ii. 64; [ed. 1744].
1783.—"Tannaserim...."—Forrest, V. to Mergui, 4.
TERAI, TERYE, s. Hind. tarāī, 'moist (land)' from tar, 'moist' or 'green.' [Others, however, connect it with tara, tala, 'beneath (the Himālaya).'] The term is specially applied to a belt of marshy and jungly land which runs along the foot of the Himālaya north of the Ganges, being that zone in which the moisture which has sunk into the talus of porous material exudes. A tract on the south side of the Ganges, now part of Bhāgalpūr, was also formerly known as the Jungle-terry (q.v.).
[The word is used as an adj. to describe a severe form of malarial fever, and also a sort of double felt hat, worn when the sun is not so powerful as to require the use of a sola topee.
THAKOOR, s. Hind. ṭhākur, from Skt. ṭhakkura, 'an idol, a deity.' Used as a term of respect, Lord, Master, &c., but with a variety of specific applications, of which the most familiar is as the style of Rājpūt nobles. It is also in some parts the honorific designation of a barber, after the odd fashion which styles a tailor khalīfa (see CALEEFA); a bihishtī, jama'-dār (see JEMADAR); a sweeper, mehtar. And in Bengal it is the name of a Brahman family, which its members have Anglicised as Tagore, of whom several have been men of character and note, the best known being Dwārkanāth Tagore, "a man of liberal opinions and enterprising character" (Wilson), who died in London in 1840.
[1798.—"The Thacur (so Rajput chieftains are called) was naked from the waist upwards, except the sacrificial thread or scarf on his shoulders and a turban on his head."—L. of Colebrooke, 462.
[1881.—"After the sons have gone to their respective offices, the mother changing her clothes retires into the thakurghar (the place of worship), and goes through her morning service...."—S. C. Bose, The Hindoos as they are, 13.]
THERMANTIDOTE, s. This learned word ("heat-antidote") was applied originally, we believe, about 1830-32 to the invention of the instrument which it designates, or rather to the application of the instrument, which is in fact a winnowing machine fitted to a window aperture, and incased in wet tatties (q.v.), so as to drive a current of cooled air into a house during hot, dry weather. We have a dim remembrance that the invention was ascribed to Dr. Spilsbury.
[Mrs Parkes saw for the first time a thermantidote at Cawnpore in 1830.—Ibid. i. 134.]
1840.—"... The thermometer at 112° all day in our tents, notwithstanding tatties, phermanticlotes,[5] and every possible invention that was likely to lessen the stifling heat."—Osborne, Court and Camp of Runjeet Singh, 132.
1853.—"... then came punkahs by day, and next punkahs by night, and then tatties, and then therm-antidotes, till at last May came round again, and found the unhappy Anglo-Indian world once more surrounded with all the necessary but uncomfortable sweltering panoply of the hot weather."—Oakfield, i. 263-4.
1878.—"They now began (c. 1840) to have the benefit of thermantidotes, which however were first introduced in 1831; the name of the inventor is not recorded."—Calcutta Rev. cxxiv. 718.
1880.—"... low and heavy punkahs swing overhead; a sweet breathing of wet khaskhas grass comes out of the thermantidote."—Sir Ali Baba, 112.
THUG, s. Hind. ṭhag, Mahr. ṭhak, Skt. sṭhaga, 'a cheat, a swindler.' And this is the only meaning given and illustrated in R. Drummond's Illustrations of Guzerattee, &c. (1808). But it has acquired a specific meaning, which cannot be exhibited more precisely or tersely than by Wilson: "Latterly applied to a robber and assassin of a peculiar class, who sallying forth in a gang ... and in the character of wayfarers, either on business or pilgrimage, fall in with other travellers on the road, and having gained their confidence, take a favourable opportunity of strangling them by throwing their handkerchiefs round their necks, and then plundering them and burying their bodies." The proper specific designation of these criminals was phānsīgar or phānsigar, from phansī, 'a noose.'
According to Mackenzie (in As. Res. xiii.) the existence of gangs of these murderers was unknown to Europeans till shortly after the capture of Seringapatam in 1799, when about 100 were apprehended in Bangalore. But Fryer had, a century earlier, described a similar gang caught and executed near Surat. The Phānsigars (under that name) figured prominently in an Anglo-Indian novel called, we think, "The English in India," which one of the present writers read in early boyhood, but cannot now trace. It must have been published between 1826 and 1830.
But the name of Thug first became thoroughly familiar not merely to that part of the British public taking an interest in Indian affairs, but even to the mass of Anglo-Indian society, through the publication of the late Sir William Sleeman's book "Ramaseeana; or a Vocabulary of the peculiar language used by the Thugs, with an Introduction and Appendix, descriptive of that Fraternity, and of the Measures which have been adopted by the Supreme Government of India for its Suppression," Calcutta, 1836; and by an article on it which appeared in the Edinburgh Review, for Jan. 1837, (lxiv. 357). One of Col. Meadows Taylor's Indian romances also, Memoirs of a Thug (1839), has served to make the name and system familiar. The suppression of the system, for there is every reason to believe that it was brought to an end, was organised in a masterly way by Sir W. (then Capt.) Sleeman, a wise and admirable man, under the government and support of Lord William Bentinck. [The question of the Thugs and their modern successors has been again discussed in the Quarterly Review, Oct. 1901.]
1673.—"They were Fifteen, all of a Gang, who used to lurk under Hedges in narrow Lanes, and as they found Opportunity, by a Device of a Weight tied to a Cotton Bow-string made of Guts, ... they used to throw it upon Passengers, so that winding it about their Necks, they pulled them from their Beasts and dragging them upon the Ground strangled them, and possessed themselves of what they had ... they were sentenced to Lex Talionis, to be hang'd; wherefore being delivered to the Catwal or Sheriff's Men, they led them two Miles with Ropes round their Necks to some Wild Date-trees: In their way thither they were chearful, and went singing, and smoaking Tobacco ... as jolly as if going to a Wedding; and the Young Lad now ready to be tied up, boasted, That though he were not 14 Years of Age, he had killed his Fifteen Men...."—Fryer, 97.
1785.—"Several men were taken up for a most cruel method of robbery and murder, practised on travellers, by a tribe called phanseegurs, or stranglers ... under the pretence of travelling the same way, they enter into conversation with the strangers, share their sweetmeats, and pay them other little attentions, until an opportunity offers of suddenly throwing a rope round their necks with a slip-knot, by which they dexterously contrive to strangle them on the spot."—Forbes, Or. Mem. iv. 13; [2nd ed. ii. 397].
1808.—"Phanseeo. A term of abuse in Guzerat, applied also, truly, to thieves or robbers who strangle children in secret or travellers on the road."—R. Drummond, Illustrations, s.v.
1820.—"In the more northern parts of India these murderers are called Thegs, signifying deceivers."—As. Res. xiii. 250.
1823.—"The Thugs are composed of all castes, Mahommedans even were admitted: but the great majority are Hindus; and among these the Brahmins, chiefly of the Bundelcund tribes, are in the greatest numbers, and generally direct the operations of the different bands."—Malcolm, Central India, ii. 187.
1831.—"The inhabitants of Jubbulpore were this morning assembled to witness the execution of 25 Thugs.... The number of Thugs in the neighbouring countries is enormous; 115, I believe, belonged to the party of which 25 were executed, and the remainder are to be transported; and report says there are as many in Sauger Jail."—Wanderings of a Pilgrim, i. 201-202.
1843.—"It is by the command, and under the special protection of the most powerful goddesses that the Thugs join themselves to the unsuspecting traveller, make friends with him, slip the noose round his neck, plunge their knives in his eyes, hide him in the earth, and divide his money and baggage."—Macaulay, Speech on Gates of Somnauth.
1874.—"If a Thug makes strangling of travellers a part of his religion, we do not allow him the free exercise of it."—W. Newman, in Fortnightly Rev., N.S. xv. 181.[Tavernier writes: "The remainder of the people, who do not belong to either of these four castes, are called Pauzecour." This word Mr. Ball (ii. 185) suggests to be equivalent to either pariah or phansigar. Here he is in error. Pauzecour is really Skt. Pancha-Gauḍa, the five classes of northern Brahmans, for which see Wilson, (Indian Caste, ii. 124 seqq.).]
TIBET, n.p. The general name of the vast and lofty table-land of which the Himālaya forms the southern marginal range, and which may be said roughly to extend from the Indus elbow, N.W. of Kashmīr, to the vicinity of Sining-fu in Kansuh (see SLING) and to Tatsienlu on the borders of Szechuen, the last a distance of 1800 miles. The origin of the name is obscure, but it came to Europe from the Mahommedans of Western Asia; its earliest appearance being in some of the Arab Geographies of the 9th century.
Names suggestive of Tibet are indeed used by the Chinese. The original form of these (according to our friend Prof. Terrien de la Couperie) was Tu-pot; a name which is traced to a prince so called, whose family reigned at Liang-chau, north of the Yellow R. (in modern Kansuh), but who in the 5th century was driven far to the south-west, and established in eastern Tibet a State to which he gave the name of Tu-pot, afterwards corrupted into Tu-poh and Tu-fan. We are always on ticklish ground in dealing with derivations from or through the Chinese. But it is doubtless possible, perhaps even probable, that these names passed into the western form Tibet, through the communication of the Arabs in Turkestan with the tribes on their eastern border. This may have some corroboration from the prevalence of the name Tibet, or some proximate form, among the Mongols, as we may gather both from Carpini and Rubruck in the 13th century (quoted below), and from Sanang Setzen, and the Mongol version of the Bodhimor several hundred years later. These latter write the name (as represented by I. J. Schmidt), Tūbet and Tōbōt.
851.—"On this side of China are the countries of the Taghazghaz and the Khākān of Tibbat; and that is the termination of China on the side of the Turks."—Relation, &c., tr. par Reinaud, pt. i. p. 60.
c. 880.—"Quand un étranger arrive au Tibet (al-Tibbat), il éprouve, sans pouvoir s'en rendre compte, un sentiment de gaieté et de bien être qui persiste jusqu'au départ."—Ibn Khurdādba, in J. As. Ser. vi. tom. v. 522.
c. 910.—"The country in which lives the goat which produces the musk of China, and that which produces the musk of Tibbat are one and the same; only the Chinese get into their hands the goats which are nearest their side, and the people of Tibbat do likewise. The superiority of the musk of Tibbat over that of China is due to two causes; first, that the musk-goat on the Tibbat side of the frontier finds aromatic plants, whilst the tracts on the Chinese side only produce plants of a common kind."—Relation, &c., pt. 2, pp. 114-115.
c. 930.—"This country has been named Tibbat because of the establishment there of the Himyarites, the word thabat signifying to fix or establish oneself. That etymology is the most likely of all that have been proposed. And it is thus that Di'bal, son of 'Alī-al-Khuzā'ī, vaunts this fact in a poem, in which when disputing with Al-Kumair he exalts the descendants of Ḳaṭḷān above those of Nizāar, saying:
"'Tis they who have been famous by their writings at the gate of Merv,
And who were writers at the gate of Chīn,
'Tis they who have bestowed on Samarkand the name of Shamr,
And who have transported thither the Tibetans" (Al-Tubbatīna).[6]
Mas'ūdī, i. 352.
c. 976.—"From the sea to Tibet is 4 months' journey, and from the sea of Fārs to the country of Kanauj is 3 months' journey."—Ibn Haukal, in Elliot, i. 33.
c. 1020.—"Bhútesar is the first city on the borders of Tibet. There the language, costume, and appearance of the people are different. Thence to the top of the highest mountain, of which we spoke ... is a distance of 20 parasangs. From the top of it Tibet looks red and Hind black."—Al-Birūnī, in Elliot, i. 57.
1075.—"Τοῦ μόσχου, διάφορα εἴδη εἰσίν· ὦν ὁ κρείττων γίνεται ἐν πόλει τινὶ πολὺ τοῦ Χοράση ἀνατολικοτερα, λεγομένη Τουπάτα· ἔστι δὲ τὴν χροιὰν ὑπόξανθον· τοῦτου δὲ ἧπτον ὁ ἀπὸ τῆς Ἰνδιάς μετακομιζόμενος· ῥέπει δὲ ἐπὶ τὸ μελάντερον· καὶ τούτου πάλιν ὑποδεέστερος ὁ ἀπὸ τῶν Σίνων ἀγόμενος· πάντες δε ἐν ὀμφαλῷ ἀπογεννῶνται ζώου τινὸς μονοκέρωτος μέγιστου ὁμοιόυ δορκάδος."—Symeon Seth, quoted by Bochart, Hieroz. III. xxvi.
1165.—"This prince is called in Arabic Sultan-al-Fars-al-Kábar ... and his empire extends from the banks of the Shat-al-Arab to the City of Samarkand ... and reaches as far as Thibet, in the forests of which country that quadruped is found which yields the musk."—Rabbi Benjamin, in Wright's Early Travels, 106.
c. 1200.—
"He went from Hindustan to the Tibat-land....
From Tibat he entered the boundaries of Chīn."
Sikandar Nāmah, E.T. by
Capt. H. W. Clarke, R.E., p. 585.
1247.—"Et dum reverteretur exercitus ille, videlicet Mongalorum, venit ad terram Buri-Thabet, quos bello vicerunt: qui sunt pagani. Qui consuetudinem mirabilem imo potius miserabilem habent: quia cum alicujus pater humanae naturae debitum solvit, omnem congregant parentelam ut comedant eum, sicut nobis dicebatur pro certo."—Joan. de Plano Carpini, in Rec. de Voyages, iv. 658.
1253.—"Post istos sunt Tebet, homines solentes comedere parentes suos defunctos, ut causa pietatis non facerent aliud sepulchrum eis nisi viscera sua."—Rubruq. in Recueil de Voyages, &c. iv. 289.
1298.—"Tebet est une grandisime provence qve lengajes ont por elles, et sunt ydres.... Il sunt maint grant laironz ... il sunt mau custumés; il ont grandismes chenz mastin qe sunt grant come asnes et sunt mout buen a prendre bestes sauvajes."—Marco Polo, Geog. Text. ch. cxvi.
1330.—"Passando questa provincia grande perveni a un altro gran regno che si chiama Tibet, ch'ene ne confini d'India ed e tutta al gran Cane ... la gente di questa contrada dimora in tende che sono fatte di feltri neri. La principale cittade è fatta tutta di pietre bianche e nere, e tutte le vie lastricate. In questa cittade dimora il Atassi (Abassi?) che viene a dire in nostro modo il Papa."—Fr. Odorico, Palatine MS., in Cathay, &c. App. p. lxi.
c. 1340.—"The said mountain (Karāchīl, the Himālaya) extends in length a space of 3 months' journey, and at the base is the country of Thabbat, which has the antelopes which give musk."—Ibn Batuta, iii. 438-439.
TICAL, s. This (tikāl) is a word which has long been in use by foreign traders to Burma, for the quasi-standard weight of (uncoined) current silver, and is still in general use in B. Burma as applied to that value. This weight is by the Burmese themselves called kyat, and is the hundredth part of the viss (q.v.), being thus equivalent to about 1¼ rupee in value. The origin of the word tikāl is doubtful. Sir A. Phayre suggests that possibly it is a corruption of the Burmese words ta-kyat, "one kyat." On the other hand perhaps it is more probable that the word may have represented the Indian ṭakā (see TUCKA). The word is also used by traders to Siam. But there likewise it is a foreign term; the Siamese word being bat. In Siam the tikal is according to Crawfurd a silver coin, as well as a weight equivalent to 225½ grs. English. In former days it was a short cylinder of silver bent double, and bearing two stamps, thus half-way between the Burmese bullion and proper coin.[7]
1585.—"Auuertendosi che vna bize di peso è per 40 once Venetiane, e ogni bize è teccali cento, e vn gito val teccali 25, e vn abocco val teccali 12½."—G. Balbi (in Pegu), f. 108.
[1615.—"Cloth to the value of six cattes (Catty) less three tiggalls."—Foster, Letters, iv. 107.
[1639.—"Four Ticals make a Tayl (Tael)."—Mandelslo, E.T. ii. 130.]
1688.—"The proportion of their (Siamese) Money to ours is, that their Tical, which weighs no more than half a Crown, is yet worth three shillings and three half-pence."—La Loubère, E.T. p. 72.
1727.—"Pegu Weight.
| 1 | Viece is | 39 ou. Troy, | |
| or 1 | Viece | 100 Teculs. | |
| 140 | Viece | a Bahaar | (see BAHAR). |
The Bahaar is 3 Pecul China."—A. Hamilton, ii. 317; [ed. 1744].
c. 1759.—"... a dozen or 20 fowls may be bought for a Tical (little more than ½ a Crown)."—In Dalrymple, Or. Rep. i. 121.
1775.—Stevens, New and Complete Guide to E.I. Trade, gives
"Pegu weight:
100 moo = 1 Tual (read Tical).
100 tual (Tical) = 1 vis (see VISS) = 3 lb. 5 oz. 5 dr. avr.
150 vis = 1 candy."
And under Siam:
"80 Tuals (Ticals) = 1 Catty.
50 Catties = 1 Pecul."
TICCA, and vulg. TICKER, adj. This is applied to any person or thing engaged by the job, or on contract. Thus a ticca garry is a hired carriage, a ticca doctor is a surgeon not in the regular service but temporarily engaged by Government. From Hind. ṭhīka, ṭhīkah, 'hire, fare, fixed price.'
1827.—"A Rule, Ordinance and Regulation for the good Order and Civil Government of the Settlement of Fort William in Bengal, and for regulating the number and fare of Teeka Palankeens, and Teeka Bearers in the Town of Calcutta ... registered in the Supreme Court of Judicature, on the 27th June, 1827."—Bengal Regulations of 1827.
1878.—"Leaving our servants to jabber over our heavier baggage, we got into a 'ticca gharry,' 'hired trap,' a bit of civilization I had hardly expected to find so far in the Mofussil."—Life in the Mofussil, ii. 94.
[TICKA, s. Hind. ṭīkā, Skt. tilaka, a mark on the forehead made with coloured earth or unguents, as an ornament, to mark sectarial distinction, accession to the throne, at betrothal, &c.; also a sort of spangle worn on the forehead by women. The word has now been given the additional meaning of the mark made in vaccination, and the ṭīkāwālā Ṣāḥib is the vaccination officer.
[1832.—"In the centre of their foreheads is a teeka (or spot) of lamp-black."—Herklots, Qanoon-e-Islam, 2nd ed. 139.
[c. 1878.—"When a sudden stampede of the children, accompanied by violent yells and sudden falls, has taken place as I entered a village, I have been informed, by way of apology, that it was not I whom the children feared, but that they supposed that I was the Tikawala Sahib."—Panjab Gazetteer, Rohtak, p. 9.]
TICKY-TOCK. This is an unmeaning refrain used in some French songs, and by foreign singing masters in their scales. It would appear from the following quotations to be of Indian origin.
[TIER-CUTTY, s. This is Malayāl. tiyar-katti, the knife used by a Tiyan or toddy-drawer for scarifying the palm-trees. The Tiyan caste take their title from Malayal. tíyyan, which again comes from Malayal. tívu, Skt. dvīpa, 'an island,' and derive their name from their supposed origin in Ceylon.
TIFFIN, s. Luncheon, Anglo-Indian and Hindustani, at least in English households. Also to Tiff, v. to take luncheon. Some have derived this word from Ar. tafannun, 'diversion, amusement,' but without history, or evidence of such an application of the Arabic word. Others have derived it from Chinese ch'ih-fan, 'eat-rice,' which is only an additional example that anything whatever may be plausibly resolved into Chinese monosyllables. We believe the word to be a local survival of an English colloquial or slang term. Thus we find in the Lexicon Balatronicum, compiled originally by Capt. Grose (1785): "Tiffing, eating or drinking out of meal-times," besides other meanings. Wright (Dict. of Obsolete and Provincial English) has: "Tiff, s. (1) a draught of liquor, (2) small beer;" and Mr. Davies (Supplemental English Glossary) gives some good quotations both of this substantive and of a verb "to tiff," in the sense of 'take off a draught.' We should conjecture that Grose's sense was a modification of this one, that his "tiffing" was a participial noun from the verb to tiff, and that the Indian tiffin is identical with the participial noun. This has perhaps some corroboration both from the form "tiffing" used in some earlier Indian examples, and from the Indian use of the verb "to Tiff." [This view is accepted by Prof. Skeat, who derives tiff from Norweg. tev, 'a drawing in of the breath, sniff,' teva, 'to sniff' (Concise Dict. s.v.; and see 9 ser. N. & Q. iv. 425, 460, 506; v. 13).] Rumphius has a curious passage which we have tried in vain to connect with the present word; nor can we find the words he mentions in either Portuguese or Dutch Dictionaries. Speaking of Toddy and the like he says:
We may observe that the comparatively late appearance of the word tiffin in our documents is perhaps due to the fact that when dinner was early no lunch was customary. But the word, to have been used by an English novelist in 1811, could not then have been new in India.
We now give examples of the various uses:
TIFF, s. In the old English senses (in which it occurs also in the form tip, and is probably allied to tipple and tipsy); [see Prof. Skeat, quoted above].
(1) For a draught:
(2) For small beer:
"... make waste more prodigal
Than when our beer was good, that John may float
To Styx in beer, and lift up Charon's boat
With wholsome waves: and as the conduits ran
With claret at the Coronation,
So let your channels flow with single tiff,
For John I hope is crown'd...."
On John Dawson, Butler of Christ Church,
in Bishop Corbet's Poems, ed. 1807, pp. 207-8.
TO TIFF, v. in the sense of taking off a draught.
"He tiff'd his punch and went to rest."
Combe, Dr. Syntax, I. Canto v.
TIFFIN (the Indian substantive).
1810.—"The (Mahommedan) ladies, like ours, indulge in tiffings (slight repasts), it being delicate to eat but little before company."—Williamson, V.M. i. 352.
" (published 1812) "The dinner is scarcely touched, as every person eats a hearty meal called tiffin, at 2 o'clock, at home."—Maria Graham, 29.
1811.—"Gertrude was a little unfortunate in her situation, which was next below Mrs. Fashionist, and who ... detailed the delights of India, and the routine of its day; the changing linen, the curry-combing ... the idleness, the dissipation, the sleeping and the necessity of sleep, the gay tiffings, were all delightful to her in reciting...."—The Countess and Gertrude, or Modes of Discipline, by Laetitia Maria Hawkins, ii. 12.
1824.—"The entreaty of my friends compelled me to remain to breakfast and an early tiffin...."—Seely, Wonders of Ellora, ch. iii.
c. 1832.—"Reader! I, as well as Pliny, had an uncle, an East Indian Uncle ... everybody has an Indian Uncle.... He is not always so orientally rich as he is reputed; but he is always orientally munificent. Call upon him at any hour from two till five, he insists on your taking tiffin; and such a tiffin! The English corresponding term is luncheon: but how meagre a shadow is the European meal to its glowing Asiatic cousin."—De Quincey, Casuistry of Roman Meals, in Works, iii. 259.
1847.—"'Come home and have some tiffin, Dobbin,' a voice cried behind him, as a pudgy hand was laid on his shoulder.... But the Captain had no heart to go a-feasting with Joe Sedley."—Vanity Fair, ed. 1867, i. 235.
1850.—"A vulgar man who enjoys a champagne tiffin and swindles his servants ... may be a pleasant companion to those who do not hold him in contempt as a vulgar knave, but he is not a gentleman."—Sir C. Napier, Farewell Address.
1853.—"This was the case for the prosecution. The court now adjourned for tiffin."—Oakfield, i. 319.
1882.—"The last and most vulgar form of 'nobbling' the press is well known as the luncheon or tiffin trick. It used to be confined to advertising tradesmen and hotel-keepers, and was practised on newspaper reporters. Now it has been practised on a loftier scale...."—Saty. Rev., March 25, 357.TO TIFF, in the Indian sense.
1814.—"We found a pool of excellent water, which is scarce on the hills, and laid down to tiff on a full soft bed, made by the grass of last year and this. After tiffing, I was cold and unwell."—Ibid. p. 283. Tiffing here is a participle, but its use shows how the noun tiffin would be originally formed.
1816.—
"The huntsman now informed them all
They were to tiff at Bobb'ry Hall.
Mounted again, the party starts,
Upsets the hackeries and carts,
Hammals (see HUMMAUL) and palanquins and doolies,
Dobies (see DHOBY) and burrawas (?) and coolies."
The Grand Master, or Adventures of Qui Hi,
by Quiz (Canto viii.).
[Burrawa is probably H. bhaṛuā, 'a pander.']
1829.—"I was tiffing with him one day, when the subject turned on the sagacity of elephants...."—John Shipp, ii. 267.
1859.—"Go home, Jack. I will tiff with you to-day at half-past two."—J. Lang, Wanderings in India, p. 16.The following, which has just met our eye, is bad grammar, according to Anglo-Indian use:
TIGER, s. The royal tiger was apparently first known to the Greeks by the expedition of Alexander, and a little later by a live one which Seleucus sent to Athens. The animal became, under the Emperors, well known to the Romans, but fell out of the knowledge of Europe in later days, till it again became familiar in India. The Greek and Latin τίγρις, tigris, is said to be from the old Persian word for an arrow, tigra, which gives the modern Pers. (and Hind.) tīr.[8] Pliny says of the River Tigris: "a celeritate Tigris incipit vocari. Ita appellant Medi sagittam" (vi. 27). In speaking of the animal and its "velocitatis tremendae," Pliny evidently glances at this etymology, real or imaginary. So does Pausanias probably, in his remarks on its colour. [This view of the origin of the name is accepted by Schrader (Prehist. Ant. of the Aryan Peoples, E.T. 250), who writes: "Nothing like so far back in the history of the Indo-Europeans does the lion's dreadful rival for supremacy over the beasts, the tiger, go. In India the songs of the Rigveda have nothing to say about him; his name (vyághrá) first occurs in the Atharvaveda, i.e. at a time when the Indian immigration must have extended much farther towards the Ganges; for it is in the reeds and grasses of Bengal that we have to look for the tiger's proper home. Nor is he mentioned among the beasts of prey in the Avesta. The district of Hyrcania, whose numerous tigers the later writers of antiquity speak of with especial frequency, was then called Vehrkana, 'wolf-land.' It is, therefore, not improbable ... that the tiger has spread in relatively late times from India over portions of W. and N. Asia."]
c. B.C. 322.—"In the island of Tylos ... there is also another wonderful thing they say ... for there is a certain tree, from which they cut sticks, and these are very handsome articles, having a certain variegated colour, like the skin of a tiger. The wood is very heavy; but if it is struck against any solid substance it shivers like a piece of pottery."—Theophrastus, H. of Plants, Bk. v. c. 4.
c. B.C. 321.—"And Ulpianus ... said: 'Do we anywhere find the word used a masculine, τὸν τίγριν? for I know that Philemon says thus in his Neaera:
'A. We've seen the tigress (τὴν τίγριν) that Seleucus sent us;
Are we not bound to send Seleucus back
Some beast in fair exchange?'"
In Athenaeus, xiii. 57.
c. B.C. 320.—"According to Megasthenes, the largest tigers are found among the Prasii, almost twice the size of lions, and of such strength that a tame one led by four persons seized a mule by its hinder leg, overpowered it, and dragged it to him."—Strabo, xv. ch. 1, § 37 (Hamilton and Falconer's E.T. iii. 97).
c. B.C. 19.—"And Augustus came to Samos, and again passed the winter there ... and all sorts of embassies came to him; and the Indians who had previously sent messages proclaiming friendship, now sent to make a solemn treaty, with presents, and among other things including tigers, which were then seen for the first time by the Romans; and if I am not mistaken by the Greeks also."—Dio Cassius, liv. 9. [See Merivale, Hist. Romans, ed. 1865, iv. 176.]
c. B.C. 19.—
"... duris genuit te cautibus horrens
Caucasus, Hyrcanaeque admôrunt ubera tigres."
Aen. iv. 366-7.
c. A.D. 70.—"The Emperor Augustus ... in the yeere that Q. Tubero and Fabius Maximus were Consuls together ... was the first of all others that shewed a tame tygre within a cage: but the Emperour Claudius foure at once.... Tygres are bred in Hircania and India: this beast is most dreadful for incomparable swiftness."—Pliny, by Ph. Holland, i. 204.
c. 80-90.—"Wherefore the land is called Dachanabadēs (see DECCAN), for the South is called Dachanos in their tongue. And the land that lies in the interior above this towards the East embraces many tracts, some of them of deserts or of great mountains, with all kinds of wild beasts, panthers and tigers (τίγρεις) and elephants, and immense serpents (δράκοντας) and hyenas (κροκόττας) and cynocephala of many species, and many and populous nations till you come to the Ganges."—Periplus, § 50.
c. A.D. 180.—"That beast again, in the talk of Ctesias about the Indians, which is alleged to be called by them Martióra (Martichóra), and by the Greeks Androphagus (Man-eater), I am convinced is really the tiger (τὸν τίγριν). The story that he has a triple range of teeth in each jaw, and sharp prickles at the tip of his tail which he shoots at those who are at a distance, like the arrows of an archer,—I don't believe it to be true, but only to have been generated by the excessive fear which the beast inspires. They have been wrong also about his colour;—no doubt when they see him in the bright sunlight he takes that colour and looks red; or perhaps it may be because of his going so fast, and because even when not running he is constantly darting from side to side; and then (to be sure) it is always from a long way off that they see him."—Pausanias, IX. xxi. 4. [See Frazer's tr. i. 470; v. 86. Martichoras is here Pers. mardumkhwūr, 'eater of men.']
1298.—"Enchore sachiés qe le Grant Sire a bien leopars asez qe tuit sunt bon da chacer et da prendre bestes.... Il ha plosors lyons grandismes, greignors asez qe cele de Babilonie. Il sunt de mout biaus poil et de mout biaus coleor, car il sunt tout vergés por lonc, noir et vermoil et blance. Il sunt afaités a prandre sengler sauvajes et les bueff sauvajes, et orses et asnes sauvajes et cerf et cavriolz et autres bestes."—Marco Polo, Geog. Text, ch. xcii. Thus Marco Polo can only speak of this huge animal, striped black and red and white, as of a Lion. And a medieval Bestiary has a chapter on the Tigre which begins: "Une Beste est qui est apelée Tigre, c'est une maniere de serpent."—(In Cahier et Martin, Mélanges d' Archéol. ii. 140).
1474.—"This meane while there came in certein men sent from a Prince of India, wth certain strange beastes, the first whereof was a leonza ledde in a chayne by one that had skyll, which they call in their languaige Babureth. She is like vnto a lyonesse; but she is redde coloured, streaked all over wth black strykes; her face is redde wth certain white and blacke spottes, the bealy white, and tayled like the lyon: seemyng to be a marvailouse fiers beast."—Josafa Barbaro, Hak. Soc. pp. 53-54. Here again is an excellent description of a tiger, but that name seems unknown to the traveller. Babureth is in the Ital. original Baburth, Pers. babr, a tiger.
1553.—"... Beginning from the point of Çingapura and all the way to Pulloçambilam, i.e. the whole length of the Kingdom of Malaca ... there is no other town with a name except this City of Malaca, only some havens of fishermen, and in the interior a very few villages. And indeed the most of these wretched people sleep at the top of the highest trees they can find, for up to a height of 20 palms the tigers can seize them at a leap; and if anything saves the poor people from these beasts it is the bonfires they keep burning at night, which the tigers are much afraid of. In fact these are so numerous that many come into the city itself at night in search of prey. And it has happened, since we took the place, that a tiger leapt into a garden surrounded by a good high timber fence, and lifted a beam of wood with three slaves who were laid by the heels, and with these made a clean leap over the fence."—Barros, II. vi. 1. Lest I am doing the great historian wrong as to this Munchausen-like story, I give the original: "E jà aconteceo ... saltar hum tigre em hum quintal cercado de madeira bem alto, e levou hum tronco de madeira com trez (tres?) escravos que estavam prezos nelle, com os quaes saltou de claro em claro per cima da cerca."
1583.—"We also escaped the peril of the multitude of tigers which infest those tracts" (the Pegu delta) "and prey on whatever they can get at. And although we were on that account anchored in midstream, nevertheless it was asserted that the ferocity of these animals was such that they would press even into the water to seize their prey."—Gasparo Balbi, f. 94v.
1586.—"We went through the wildernesse because the right way was full of thieves, when we passed the country of Gouren, where we found but few Villages, but almost all Wildernesse, and saw many Buffes, Swine, and Deere, Grasse longer than a man, and very many Tigres."—R. Fitch, in Purchas, ii. 1736.
1675.—"Going in quest whereof, one of our Soldiers, a Youth, killed a Tigre-Royal; it was brought home by 30 or 40 Combies (Koonbee), the Body tied to a long Bamboo, the Tail extended ... it was a Tigre of the Biggest and Noblest Kind, Five Feet in Length beside the Tail, Three and a Half in Height, it was of a light Yellow, streaked with Black, like a Tabby Cat ... the Visage Fierce and Majestick, the Teeth gnashing...."—Fryer, 176.
1683.—"In ye afternoon they found a great Tiger, one of ye black men shot a barbed arrow into his Buttock. Mr. Frenchfeild and Capt. Raynes alighted off their horses and advanced towards the thicket where ye Tiger lay. The people making a great noise, ye Tiger flew out upon Mr. Frenchfeild, and he shot him with a brace of Bullets into ye breast: at which he made a great noise, and returned again to his den. The Black Men seeing of him wounded fell upon him, but the Tiger had so much strength as to kill 2 men, and wound a third, before he died. At Night ye Ragea sent me the Tiger."—Hedges, Diary, Hak. Soc. i. 66-67.
1754.—"There was a Charter granted to the East India Company. Many Disputes arose about it, which came before Parliament; all Arts were used to corrupt or delude the Members; among others a Tyger was baited with Solemnity, on the Day the great Question was to come on. This was such a Novelty, that several of the Members were drawn off from their Attendance, and absent on the Division...."—A Collection of Letters relating to the E.I. Company, &c. (Tract), 1754, p. 13.
1869.—"Les tigres et les léopards sont considérés, autant par les Hindous que par les musalmans, comme étant la propriété des pirs (see PEER): aussi les naturels du pays ne sympathisent pas avec les Européens pour la chasse du tigre."—Garcin de Tassy, Rel. Mus. p. 24.
1872.—"One of the Frontier Battalion soldiers approached me, running for his life.... This was his story:—
'Sahib, I was going along with the letters ... which I had received from your highness ... a great tiger came out and stood in the path. Then I feared for my life; and the tiger stood, and I stood, and we looked at each other. I had no weapon but my kukri (Kookry) ... and the Government letters. So I said, 'My lord Tiger, here are the Government letters, the letters of the Honourable Kumpany Bahadur ... and it is necessary for me to go on with them.' The tiger never ceased looking at me, and when I had done speaking he growled, but he never offered to get out of the way. On this I was much more afraid, so I kneeled down and made obeisance to him; but he did not take any more notice of that either, so at last I told him I should report the matter to the Sahib, and I threw down the letters in front of him, and came here as fast as I was able. Sahib, I now ask for your justice against that tiger.'"—Lt.-Col. T. Lewin, A Fly on the Wheel, p. 444.
TINCALL, s. Borax. Pers. tinkār, but apparently originally Skt. ṭaṇkaṇa, and perhaps from the people so called who may have supplied it, in the Himālaya—Τάγγανοι of Ptolemy. [Mr. Atkinson (Himalayan Gazz. ii. 357) connects the name of this people with that of the tangun pony.]
1563.—"It is called borax and crisocola; and in Arabic tincar, and so the Guzeratis call it...."—Garcia, f. 78.
c. 1590.—"Having reduced the k'haral to small bits, he adds to every man of it 1½ sers of tangár (borax) and 3 sers of pounded natrum, and kneads them together."—Āīn, i. 26.
[1757.—"A small quantity of Tutenegg (Tootnague), Tinkal and Japan Copper was also found here...."—Ives, 105.]
TINDAL, s. Malayāl. taṇḍal, Telug. taṇḍelu, also in Mahr. and other vernaculars ṭaṇḍel, ṭaṇḍail, [which Platts connects with ṭānḍā, Skt. tantra, 'a line of men,' but the Madras Gloss. derives the S. Indian forms from Mal. tandu, 'an oar,' valli, 'to pull.'] The head or commander of a body of men; but in ordinary specific application a native petty officer of lascars, whether on board ship (boatswain) or in the ordnance department, and sometimes the head of a gang of labourers on public works.
c. 1590.—"In large ships there are twelve classes. 1. The Nákhudá, or owner of the ship.... 3. The Tandíl, or chief of the khaláçis (see CLASSY) or sailors...."—Āīn, i. 280.
1673.—"The Captain is called Nucquedah, the boatswain Tindal...."—Fryer, 107.
1758.—"One Tindal, or Corporal of Lascars."—Orme, ii. 339.
[1826.—"I desired the tindal, or steersman to answer, 'Bombay.'"—Pandurang Hari, ed. 1873, ii. 157.]
TINNEVELLY, n.p. A town and district of Southern India, probably Tiru-nel-vēli, 'Sacred Rice-hedge.' [The Madras Gloss. gives 'Sacred Paddy-village.'] The district formed the southern part of the Madura territory, and first became a distinct district about 1744, when the Madura Kingdom was incorporated with the territories under the Nawāb of Arcot (Caldwell, H. of Tinnevelly).
TIPARRY, s. Beng. and Hind. tipārī, tepārī, the fruit of Physalis peruviana, L., N.O. Solanaceae. It is also known in India as 'Cape gooseberry,' [which is usually said to take its name from the Cape of Good Hope, but as it is a native of tropical America, Mr. Ferguson (8 ser. N. & Q. xii. 106) suggests that the word may really be cape or cap, from the peculiarity of its structure noted below.] It is sometimes known as 'Brazil cherry.' It gets its generic name from the fact that the inflated calyx encloses the fruit as in a bag or bladder (φύσα). It has a slightly acid gooseberry flavour, and makes excellent jam. We have seen a suggestion somewhere that the Bengali name is connected with the word tenpā, 'inflated,' which gives its name to a species of tetrodon or globe-fish, a fish which has the power of dilating the œsophagus in a singular manner. The native name of the fruit in N.W. India is māk or māko, but tipārī is in general Anglo-Indian use. The use of an almost identical name for a gooseberry-like fruit, in a Polynesian Island (Kingsmill group) quoted below from Wilkes, is very curious, but we can say no more on the matter.
TIPPOO SAHIB, n.p. The name of this famous enemy of the English power in India was, according to C. P. Brown, taken from that of Tipū Sultān, a saint whose tomb is near Hyderabad. [Wilks (Hist. Sketches, i. 522, ed. 1869), says that the tomb is at Arcot.]
TIRKUT, s. Foresail. Sea Hind. from Port. triquette (Roebuck).
TIYAN, n.p. Malayāl. Tīyan, or Tīvan, pl. Tīyar or Tīvar. The name of what may be called the third caste (in rank) of Malabar. The word signifies 'islander,' [from Mal. tīvu, Skt. dvīpa, 'an island']; and the people are supposed to have come from Ceylon (see TIER CUTTY).
1516.—"The cleanest of these low and rustic people are called Tuias (read Tivas), who are great labourers, and their chief business is to look after the palm-trees, and gather their fruit, and carry everything ... for hire, because there are no draught cattle in the country."—Barbosa, Lisbon ed. 335.
[1800.—"All Tirs can eat together, and intermarry. The proper duty of the cast is to extract the juice from palm-trees, to boil it down to Jagory (Jaggery), and to distil it into spirituous liquors; but they are also very diligent as cultivators, porters, and cutters of firewood."—Buchanan, Mysore, ii. 415; and see Logan, Malabar, i. 110, 142.]
TOBACCO, s. On this subject we are not prepared to furnish any elaborate article, but merely to bring together a few quotations touching on the introduction of tobacco into India and the East, or otherwise of interest.
" "It has happened to me several times, that going through the provinces of Guatemala and Nicaragua I have entered the house of an Indian who had taken this herb, which in the Mexican language is called tabacco, and immediately perceived the sharp fetid smell of this truly diabolical and stinking smoke, I was obliged to go away in haste, and seek some other place."—Girolamo Benzoni, Hak. Soc. p. 81. [The word tabaco is from the language of Hayti, and meant, first, the pipe, secondly, the plant, thirdly, the sleep which followed its use (Mr. J. Platt, 9 ser. N. & Q. viii. 322).]
1585.—"Et hi" (viz. Ralph Lane and the first settlers in Virginia) "reduces Indicam illam plantam quam Tabaccam vocant et Nicotiam, qua contra cruditates ab Indis edocti, usi erant, in Angliam primi, quod suam, intulerunt. Ex illo sane tempore usu coepit esse creberrimo, et magno pretio, dum quam plurimi graveolentem illius fumum, alii lascivientes, alii valetudini consulentes, per tubulum testaceum inexplebili aviditate passim hauriunt, et mox e naribus efflant; adeo ut tabernae Tabaccanae non minus quam cervisiariae et vinariae passim per oppida habeantur. Ut Anglorum corpora (quod salse ille dixit) qui hac plantâ tantopere delectantur in Barbarorum naturam degenerasse videantur; quum iisdem quibus Barbari delectentur et sanari se posse credant."—Gul. Camdeni, Annal. Rerum Anglicanum ... regn. Elizabetha, ed. 1717, ii. 449.
1592.—
"Into the woods thence forth in haste shee went
To seeke for hearbes that mote him remedy;
For shee of herbes had great intendiment,
Taught of the Nymphe which from her infancy
Her nourced had in true Nobility:
This whether yt divine Tobacco were,
Or Panachaea, or Polygony,
Shee fownd, and brought it to her patient deare
Who al this while lay bleding out his hart-blood neare."
The Faerie Queen, III. v. 32.
1597.—"His Lordship" (E. of Essex at Villafranca) "made no answer, but called for tobacco, seeming to give but small credit to this alarm; and so on horseback, with these noblemen and gentlemen on foot beside him, took tobacco, whilst I was telling his Lordship of the men I had sent forth, and the order I had given them. Within some quarter of an hour, we might hear a good round volley of shot betwixt the 30 men I had sent to the chapel, and the enemy, which made his Lordship cast his pipe from him, and listen to the shooting."—Commentaries of Sir Francis Vere, p. 62.
1598.—"Cob. Ods me I marle what pleasure or felicity they have in taking this roguish tobacco. It is good for nothing but to choke a man, and fill him full of smoke and embers: there were four died out of one house last week with taking of it, and two more the bell went for yesternight; one of them they say will never scape it; he voided a bushel of soot yesterday upward and downward ... its little better than rats-bane or rosaker."—Every Man in his Humour, iii. 2.
1604.—"Oct. 19. Demise to Tho. Lane and Ph. Bold of the new Impost of 6s. 8d., and the old Custom of 2d. per pound on tobacco."—Calendar of State Papers, Domestic, James I., p. 159.
1604 or 1605.—"In Bijápúr I had found some tobacco. Never having seen the like in India, I brought some with me, and prepared a handsome pipe of jewel work.... His Majesty (Akbar) was enjoying himself after receiving my presents, and asking me how I had collected so many strange things in so short a time, when his eye fell upon the tray with the pipe and its appurtenances: he expressed great surprise and examined the tobacco, which was made up in pipefuls; he inquired what it was, and where I had got it. The Nawab Khán-i-'Azam replied: 'This is tobacco, which is well known in Mecca and Medina, and this doctor has brought it as a medicine for your Majesty.' His Majesty looked at it, and ordered me to prepare and take him a pipeful. He began to smoke it, when his physician approached and forbade his doing so" ... (omitting much that is curious). "As I had brought a large supply of tobacco and pipes, I sent some to several of the nobles, while others sent to ask for some; indeed all, without exception, wanted some, and the practice was introduced. After that the merchants began to sell it, so the custom of smoking spread rapidly."—Asad Beg, in Elliot, vi. 165-167.
1610.—"The Turkes are also incredible takers of Opium ... carrying it about with them both in peace and in warre; which they say expelleth all feare, and makes them couragious; but I rather think giddy headed.... And perhaps for the self same cause they also delight in Tobacco; they take it through reeds that have ioyned vnto them great heads of wood to containe it: I doubt not but lately taught them, as brought them by the English: and were it not sometimes lookt into (for Morat Bassa not long since commanded a pipe to be thrust through the nose of a Turke, and so to be led in derision through the Citie,) no question but it would prove a principall commodity. Neverthelesse they will take it in corners, and are so ignorant therein, that that which in England is not saleable, doth passe here amongst them for most excellent."—Sandys, Journey, 66.
1615.—"Il tabacco ancora usano qui" (at Constantinople) "di pigliar in conversazione per gusto: ma io non ho voluto mai provarne, e ne avera cognizione in Italia che molti ne pigliano, ed in particolare il signore cardinale Crescenzio qualche volta per medicamento insegnatogli dal Signor don Virginio Orsino, che primo di tutti, se io non fallo, gli anni addietro lo portò in Roma d'Inghilterra."—P. della Valle, i. 76.
1616.—"Such is the miraculous omnipotence of our strong tasted Tobacco, as it cures al sorts of diseases (which neuer any drugge could do before) in all persons and at all times.... It cures the gout in the feet and (which is miraculous) in that very instant when the smoke thereof, as light, flies vp into the head, the virtue thereof, as heauy, runs down to the litle toe. It helps all sorts of agues. It refreshes a weary man, and yet makes a man hungry. Being taken when they goe to bed, it makes one sleepe soundly, and yet being taken when a man is sleepie and drousie, it will, as they say, awake his braine, and quicken his vnderstanding.... O omnipotent power of Tobacco! And if it could by the smoake thereof chase out deuils, as the smoake of Tobias fish did (which I am sure could smell no stronglier) it would serve for a precious Relicke, both for the Superstitious Priests, and the insolent Puritanes, to cast out deuils withall."—K. James I., Counterblaste to Tobacco, in Works, pp. 219-220.
1617.—"As the smoking of tobacco (tambákú) had taken very bad effect upon the health and mind of many persons, I ordered that no one should practise the habit. My brother Sháh 'Abbás, also being aware of its evil effects, had issued a command against the use of it in Irán. But Khán-i-'Alam was so much addicted to smoking, that he could not abstain from it, and often smoked."—Memoirs of Jahángír, in Elliot, v. 851. See the same passage rendered by Blochmann, in Ind. Antiq. i. 164.
1623.—"Incipit nostro seculo in immensum crescere usus tobacco, atque afficit homines occulta quidem delectatione, ut qui illi semel assueti sint, difficile postea abstinent."—Bacon, H. Vitae et Mortis, in B. Montague's ed. x. 189.We are unable to give the date or Persian author of the following extract (though clearly of the 17th century), which with an introductory sentence we have found in a fragmentary note in the handwriting of the late Major William Yule, written in India about the beginning of last century:[9]
c. 1760.—"Tambákú. It is known from the Maásir-i-Rahímí that the tobacco came from Europe to the Dakhin, and from the Dakhin to Upper India, during the reign of Akbar Sháh (1556-1605), since which time it has been in general use."—Bahár-i'-Ajam, quoted by Blochmann, in Ind. Antiq. i. 164.
1878.—It appears from Miss Bird's Japan that tobacco was not cultivated in that country till 1605. In 1612 and 1615 the Shogun prohibited both culture and use of tabako.—See the work, i. 276-77. [According to Mr. Chamberlain (Things Japanese, 3rd ed. p. 402) by 1651 the law was so far relaxed that smoking was permitted, but only out-of-doors.]
TOBRA, s. Hind. tobṛā, [which, according to Platts, is Skt. protha, 'nose of a horse,' inverted]. The leather nose-bag in which a horse's feed is administered. "In the Nerbudda valley, in Central India, the women wear a profusion of toe-rings, some standing up an inch high. Their shoes are consequently curiously shaped, and are called tobras" (M.-Gen. R. H. Keatinge). As we should say, 'buckets.' [The use of the nosebag is referred to by Sir T. Herbert (ed. 1634): "The horses (of the Persians) feed usually of barley and chopt-straw put into a bag, and fastened about their heads, which implyes the manger." Also see TURA.]
TODDY, s. A corruption of Hind. tāṛī, i.e. the fermented sap of the tāṛ or palmyra, Skt. tāla, and also of other palms, such as the date, the coco-palm, and the Caryota urens; palm-wine. Toddy is generally the substance used in India as yeast, to leaven bread. The word, as is well known, has received a new application in Scotland, the immediate history of which we have not traced. The tāla-tree seems to be indicated, though confusedly, in this passage of Megasthenes from Arrian:
c. 1330.—"... There is another tree of a different species, which ... gives all the year round a white liquor, pleasant to drink, which tree is called tari."—Fr. Jordanus, 16.
[1554.—"There is in Gujaret a tree of the palm-tribe, called tari agadji (millet tree). From its branches cups are suspended, and when the cut end of a branch is placed into one of these vessels, a sweet liquid, something of the nature of arrack, flows out in a continuous stream ... and presently changes into a most wonderful wine."—Travels of Sidi Ali Reïs, trans. A. Vambéry, p. 29.]
[1609-10.—"Tarree." See under SURA.]
1611.—"Palmiti Wine, which they call Taddy."—N. Dounton, in Purchas, i. 298.
[1614.—"A sort of wine that distilleth out of the Palmetto trees, called Tadie."—Foster, Letters, iii. 4.]
1615.—
"... And then more to glad yee
Weele have a health to al our friends in Tadee."
Verses to T. Coryat, in Crudities, iii. 47.
1623.—"... on board of which we stayed till nightfall, entertaining with conversation and drinking tari, a liquor which is drawn from the coco-nut trees, of a whitish colour, a little turbid, and of a somewhat rough taste, though with a blending in sweetness, and not unpalatable, something like one of our vini piccanti. It will also intoxicate, like wine, if drunk over freely."—P. della Valle, ii. 530; [Hak. Soc. i. 62].
[1634.—"The Toddy-tree is like the Date of Palm; the Wine called Toddy is got by wounding and piercing the Tree, and putting a Jar or Pitcher under it, so as the Liquor may drop into it."—Sir T. Herbert, in Harris, i. 408.]
1648.—"The country ... is planted with palmito-trees, from which a sap is drawn called Terry, that they very commonly drink."—Van Twist, 12.
1653.—"... le tari qui est le vin ordinaire des Indes."—De la Boullaye-le-Gouz, 246.
1673.—"The Natives singing and roaring all Night long; being drunk with Toddy, the Wine of the Cocoe."—Fryer, 53.
" "As for the rest, they are very respectful, unless the Seamen and Soldiers get drunk, either with Toddy or Bang."—Ibid. 91.
1686.—"Besides the Liquor or Water in the Fruit, there is also a sort of Wine drawn from the Tree called Toddy, which looks like Whey."—Dampier, i. 293.
1705.—"... cette liqueur s'appelle tarif."—Luillier, 43.
1710.—This word was in common use at Madras.—Wheeler, ii. 125.
1750.—"J. Was vor Leute trincken Taddy? C. Die Soldaten, die Land Portugiesen, die Parreier (see PARIAH) und Schiffleute trincken diesen Taddy."—Madras, oder Fort St. George, &c., Halle, 1750.
1857.—"It is the unfermented juice of the Palmyra which is used as food: when allowed to ferment, which it will do before midday, if left to itself, it is changed into a sweet, intoxicating drink called 'kal' or 'toddy.'"—Bp. Caldwell, Lectures on Tinnevelly Mission, p. 33.
¶ "The Rat, returning home full of Toddy, said, If I meet the Cat, I will tear him in pieces."—Ceylon Proverb, in Ind. Antiq. i. 59.Of the Scotch application of the word we can find but one example in Burns, and, strange to say, no mention in Jameson's Dictionary:
"The lads an' lasses, blythely bent
To mind baith saul an' body,
Sit round the table, weel content
An' steer about the toddy...."
Burns, The Holy Fair.
1798.—"Action of the case, for giving her a dose in some toddy, to intoxicate and inflame her passions."—Roots's Reports, i. 80.
1804.—
"... I've nae fear for't;
For siller, faith, ye ne'er did care for't,
Unless to help a needful body,
An' get an antrin glass o' toddy."
Tannahill, Epistle to James Barr.
TODDY-BIRD, s. We do not know for certain what bird is meant by this name in the quotation. The nest would seem to point to the Baya, or Weaver-bird (Ploceus Baya, Blyth): but the size alleged is absurd; it is probably a blunder. [Another bird, the Artamus fuscus, is, according to Balfour (Cycl. s.v.) called the toddy shrike.]
TODDY-CAT, s. This name is in S. India applied to the Paradoxurus Musanga, Jerdon: [the P. niger, the Indian Palm-Civet of Blanford (Mammalia, 106).] It infests houses, especially where there is a ceiling of cloth (see CHUTT). Its name is given for its fondness, real or supposed, for palm-juice.
[TOKO, s. Slang for 'a thrashing.' The word is imper. of Hind. ṭoknā, 'to censure, blame,' and has been converted into a noun on the analogy of bunnow and other words of the same kind.
TOLA, s. An Indian weight (chiefly of gold or silver), not of extreme antiquity. Hind. tolā, Skt. tulā, 'a balance,' tul, 'to lift up, to weigh.' The Hindu scale is 8 rattīs (see RUTTEE) = 1 māsha, 12 māshas = 1 tolā. Thus the tolā was equal to 96 rattīs. The proper weight of the rattī, which was the old Indian unit of weight, has been determined by Mr. E. Thomas as 1.75 grains, and the medieval tanga which was the prototype of the rupee was of 100 rattīs weight. "But ... the factitious rattī of the Muslims was merely an aliquot part—1⁄96 of the comparatively recent tola, and 1⁄92 of the newly devised rupee." By the Regulation VII. of 1833, putting the British India coinage on its present footing (see under SEER) the tolā weighing 180 grs., which is also the weight of the rupee, is established by the same Regulation, as the unit of the system of weights, 80 tolas = 1 ser, 40 sers = 1 Maund.
1610.—"A Tole is a rupee challany of silver, and ten of these Toles are the value of one of gold."—Hawkins, in Purchas, i. 217.
1615-16.—"Two tole and a half being an ounce."—Sir T. Roe, in Purchas, i. 545; [Hak. Soc. i. 183].
1676.—"Over all the Empire of the Great Mogul, all the Gold and Silver is weigh'd with Weights, which they call Tolla, which amounts to 9 deniers and eight grains of our weight."—Tavernier, E.T. ii. 18; [ed. Ball, i. 14].
TOMAUN, s. A Mongol word, signifying 10,000, and constantly used in the histories of the Mongol dynasties for a division of an army theoretically consisting of that number. But its modern application is to a Persian money, at the present time worth about 7s. 6d. [In 1899 the exchange was about 53 crans to the £1; 10 Crans = 1 tumān.] Till recently it was only a money of account, representing 10,000 dīnārs; the latter also having been in Persia for centuries only a money of account, constantly degenerating in value. The tomaun in Fryer's time (1677) is reckoned by him as equal to £3, 6s. 8d. P. della Valle's estimate 60 years earlier would give about £4, 10s. 0d., and is perhaps loose and too high. Sir T. Herbert's valuation (5 × 13s. 8d.) is the same as Fryer's. In the first and third of the following quotations we have the word in the Tartar military sense, for a division of 10,000 men:
c. 1340.—"Ces deux portions réunies formaient un total de 800 toumans, dont chacun vaut 10,000 dinars courants, et le dinar 6 dirhems."—Shihābuddīn, Masālak-al Abṣār, in Not. et Exts. xiii. 194.
c. 1347.—"I was informed ... that when the Kān assembled his troops, and called the array of his forces together, there were with him 100 divisions of horse, each composed of 10,000 men, the chief of whom was called Amīr Tumān, or lord of 10,000."—Ibn Batuta, iv. 299-300.
A form of the Tartar word seems to have passed into Russian:
c. 1559.—"One thousand in the language of the people is called Tissutze: likewise ten thousand in a single word Tma: twenty thousand Duuetma: thirty thousand Titma."—Herberstein, Della Moscovia, Ramusio, iii. 159.
[c. 1590.—In the Sarkár of Kandahár "eighteen dinárs make a tumán, and each tumán is equivalent to 800 dáms. The tumán of Khurasán is equal in value to 30 rupees and the tumán of Irák to 40."—Āīn, ed. Jarrett, ii. 393-94.]
1619.—"L'ambasciadore Indiano ... ordinò che donasse a tutti un tomano, cioè dieci zecchini per uno."—P. della Valle, ii. 22.
c. 1630.—"But how miserable so ere it seemes to others, the Persian King makes many happy harvests; filling every yeere his insatiate coffers with above 350,000 Tomans (a Toman is five markes sterlin)."—Sir T. Herbert, p. 225.
[c. 1665.—In Persia "the abási is worth 4 sháhis, and the tomán 50 abásis or 200 sháhis."—Tavernier, ed. Ball, i. 24.]
1677.—"... Receipt of Custom (at Gombroon) for which he pays the King yearly Twenty-two thousand Thomands, every Thomand making Three pound and a Noble in our Accompt, Half which we have a Right to."—Fryer, 222.
1711.—"Camels, Houses, &c., are generally sold by the Tomand, which is 200 Shahees or 50 Abassees; and they usually reckon their Estates that way; such a man is worth so many Tomands, as we reckon by Pounds in England."—Lockyer, 229.
[1858.—"Girwur Singh, Tomandar, came up with a detachment of the special police."—Sleeman, Journey through Oudh, ii. 17.]
TOMBACK, s. An alloy of copper and zinc, i.e. a particular modification of brass, formerly imported from Indo-Chinese countries. Port. tambaca, from Malay tāmbaga and tămbaga, 'copper,' which is again from Skt. tamṛika and tāmra.
1690.—"This Tombac is a kind of Metal, whose scarcity renders it more valuable than Gold.... 'Tis thought to be a kind of natural Compound of Gold, Silver, and Brass, and in some places the mixture is very Rich, as at Borneo, and the Moneilloes, in others more allayed, as at Siam."—Ovington, 510.
1759.—"The Productions of this Country (Siam) are prodigious quantities of Grain, Cotton, Benjamin ... and Tambanck."—In Dalrymple, i. 119.
TOM-TOM, s. Ṭamṭam, a native drum. The word comes from India, and is chiefly used there. Forbes (Rās-Mālā, ii. 401) [ed. 1878, p. 665] says the thing is so called because used by criers who beat it tām-tām, 'place by place,' i.e. first at one place, then at another. But it is rather an onomatopoeia, not belonging to any language in particular. In Ceylon it takes the form tamaṭṭama, in Tel. tappeta, in Tam. tambattam; in Malay it is toṅtoṅ, all with the same meaning. [When badminton was introduced at Satāra natives called it Ṭamṭam phūl khel, ṭam-ṭam meaning 'battledore,' and the shuttlecock looked like a flower (phūl). Tommy Atkins promptly turned this into "Tom Fool" (Calcutta Rev. xcvi. 346).] In French the word tamtam is used, not for a drum of any kind, but for a Chinese gong (q.v.). M. Littré, however, in the Supplement to his Dict., remarks that this use is erroneous.
1711.—"Their small Pipes, and Tom Toms, instead of Harmony made the Discord the greater."—Lockyer, 235.
1755.—In the Calcutta Mayor's expenses we find:
"Tom Tom, R. 1 1 0."—In Long, 56.
1764.—"You will give strict orders to the Zemindars to furnish Oil and Musshauls, and Tom Toms and Pikemen, &c., according to custom."—Ibid. 391.
1770.—"... An instrument of brass which the Europeans lately borrowed from the Turks to add to their military music, and which is called a tam" (!).—Abbé Raynal, tr. 1777, i. 30.
1789.—"An harsh kind of music from a tom-tom or drum, accompanied by a loud rustic pipe, sounds from different parties throughout the throng...."—Munro, Narrative, 73.
1804.—"I request that they may be hanged; and let the cause of their punishment be published in the bazar by beat of tom-tom."—Wellington, iii. 186.
1824.—"The Mahrattas in my vicinity kept up such a confounded noise with the tamtams, cymbals, and pipes, that to sleep was impossible."—Seely, Wonders of Ellora, ch. iv.
1836.—For the use of the word by Dickens, see under GUM-GUM.
1862.—"The first musical instruments were without doubt percussive sticks, calabashes, tomtoms."—Herbert Spencer, First Principles, 356.
1881.—"The tom-tom is ubiquitous. It knows no rest. It is content with depriving man of his. It selects by preference the hours of the night as the time for its malign influence to assert its most potent sway. It reverberates its dull unmeaning monotones through the fitful dreams which sheer exhaustion brings. It inspires delusive hopes by a brief lull only to break forth with refreshed vigour into wilder ecstacies of maniacal fury—accompanied with nasal incantations and protracted howls...."—Overland Times of India, April 14.
TONGA, s. A kind of light and small two-wheeled vehicle, Hind, tāngā, [Skt. tamanga, 'a platform']. The word has become familiar of late years, owing to the use of the tonga in a modified form on the roads leading up to Simla, Darjeeling, and other hill-stations. [Tavernier speaks of a carriage of this kind, but does not use the word:
1874.—"The villages in this part of the country are usually superior to those in Poona or Sholápur, and the people appear to be in good circumstances.... The custom too, which is common, of driving light Tongas drawn by ponies or oxen points to the same conclusion."—Settlement Report of Násik.
1879.—"A tongha dâk has at last been started between Rajpore and Dehra. The first tongha took only 5½ hours from Rajpore to Saharunpore."—Pioneer Mail.
1880.—"In the (Times) of the 19th of April we are told that 'Syud Mahomed Padshah has repulsed the attack on his fort instigated by certain moolahs of tonga dâk.'... Is the relentless tonga a region of country or a religious organization?... The original telegram appears to have contemplated a full stop after 'certain moollahs.' Then came an independent sentence about the tonga dâk working admirably between Peshawur and Jellalabad, but the sub-editor of the Times, interpreting the message referred to, made sense of it in the way we have seen, associating the ominous mystery with the moollahs, and helping out the other sentence with some explanatory ideas of his own."—Pioneer Mail, June 10.
1881.—"Bearing in mind Mr. Framji's extraordinary services, notably those rendered during the mutiny, and ... that he is crippled for life ... by wounds received while gallantly defending the mail tonga cart in which he was travelling, when attacked by dacoits...."—Letter from Bombay Govt. to Govt. of India, June 17, 1881.
TONICATCHY, TUNNYKETCH, s. In Madras this is the name of the domestic water-carrier, who is generally a woman, and acts as a kind of under housemaid. It is a corr. of Tamil tannir-kāssi, tannikkāriççi, an abbreviation of tannīr-kāsatti, 'water-woman.'
TONJON, and vulg. TOMJOHN, s. A sort of sedan or portable chair. It is (at least in the Bengal Presidency) carried like a palankin by a single pole and four bearers, whereas a jompon (q.v.), for use in a hilly country, has two poles like a European sedan, each pair of bearers bearing it by a stick between the poles, to which the latter are slung. We cannot tell what the origin of this word is, nor explain the etymology given by Williamson below, unless it is intended for thām-jāngh, which might mean 'support-thigh.' Mr. Platts gives as forms in Hind. tāmjhām and thāmjān. The word is perhaps adopted from some trans-gangetic language. A rude contrivance of this kind in Malabar is described by Col. Welsh under the name of a 'Tellicherry chair' (ii. 40).
1810.—"About Dacca, Chittagong, Tipperah, and other mountainous parts, a very light kind of conveyance is in use, called a taum-jaung, i.e. 'a support to the feet.'"—Williamson, V.M. i. 322-23.
" "Some of the party at the tents sent a tonjon, or open chair, carried like a palankeen, to meet me."—Maria Graham, 166.
[1827.—"In accordance with Lady D'Oyly's earnest wish I go out every morning in her tonjin."—Diary of Mrs. Fenton, 100.]
1829.—"I had been conveyed to the hill in Hanson's tonjon, which differs only from a palanquin in being like the body of a gig with a head to it."—Mem. of Col. Mountain, 88.
[1832.—"... I never seat myself in the palankeen or thonjaun without a feeling bordering on self-reproach...."—Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali, Observations, i. 320.]
1839.—"He reined up his ragged horse, facing me, and dancing about till I had passed; then he dashed past me at full gallop, wheeled round, and charged my tonjon, bending down to his saddlebow, pretending to throw a lance, showing his teeth, and uttering a loud quack!"—Letters from Madras, 290.
[1849.—"We proceeded to Nawabgunge, the minister riding out with me, for some miles, to take leave, as I sat in my tonjohn."—Sleeman, Journey through Oudh, i. 2.]
TOOLSY, s. The holy Basil of the Hindus (Ocimum sanctum, L.), Skt. tulsī or tulasī, frequently planted in a vase upon a pedestal of masonry in the vicinity of Hindu temples or dwellings. Sometimes the ashes of deceased relatives are preserved in these domestic shrines. The practice is alluded to by Fr. Odoric as in use at Tana, near Bombay (see Cathay, i. 59, c. 1322); and it is accurately described by the later ecclesiastic quoted below. See also Ward's Hindoos, ii. 203. The plant has also a kind of sanctity in the Greek Church, and a character for sanitary value at least on the shores of the Mediterranean generally.
1672.—"Almost all the Hindus ... adore a plant like our Basilico gentile, but of more pungent odour.... Every one before his house has a little altar, girt with a wall half an ell high, in the middle of which they erect certain pedestals like little towers, and in these the shrub is grown. They recite their prayers daily before it, with repeated prostrations, sprinklings of water, &c. There are also many of these maintained at the bathing-places, and in the courts of the pagodas."—P. Vincenzo Maria, 300.
1673.—"They plaster Cow-dung before their Doors; and so keep themselves clean, having a little place or two built up a Foot Square of Mud, where they plant Calaminth, or (by them called) Tulce, which they worship every Morning, and tend with Diligence."—Fryer, 199.
1842.—"Veneram a planta chamada Tulosse, por dizerem é do pateo dos Deoses, e por isso é commun no pateo de suas casas, e todas as manhãs lhe vão tributar veneração."—Annaes Maritimos, iii. 453.
1872.—"At the head of the ghát, on either side, is a sacred tulasi plant ... placed on a high pedestal of masonry."—Govinda Samanta, i. 18.The following illustrates the esteem attached to Toolsy in S. Europe:
TOOMONGONG, s. A Malay title, especially known as borne by one of the chiefs of Johōr, from whom the Island of Singapore was purchased. The Sultans of Johōr are the representatives of the old Mahommedan dynasty of Malacca, which took refuge in Johōr, and the adjoining islands (including Bintang especially), when expelled by Albuquerque in 1511, whilst the Tumanggung was a minister who had in Peshwa fashion appropriated the power of the Sultan, with hereditary tenure: and this chief now lives, we believe, at Singapore. Crawfurd says: "The word is most probably Javanese; and in Java is the title of a class of nobles, not of an office" (Malay Dict. s.v.)
[1830.—"This (Bopáti), however, is rather a title of office than of mere rank, as these governors are sometimes Tumúng'gungs, An'gebáis, and of still inferior rank."—Raffles, Java, 2nd ed. i. 299.]
1884.—"Singapore had originally been purchased from two Malay chiefs; the Sultan and Tumangong of Johore. The former, when Sir Stamford Raffles entered into the arrangement with them, was the titular sovereign, whilst the latter, who held an hereditary office, was the real ruler."—Cavenagh, Reminis. of an Indian Official, 273.
TOON, TOON-WOOD, s. The tree and timber of the Cedrela Toona, Roxb. N.O. Meliaceae. Hind. tun, tūn, Skt. tunna. The timber is like a poor mahogany, and it is commonly used for furniture and fine joiner's work in many parts of India. It is identified by Bentham with the Red Cedar of N.S. Wales and Queensland (Cedrela australis, F. Mueller). See Brandis, Forest Flora, 73. A sp. of the same genus (C. sinensis) is called in Chinese ch'un, which looks like the same word.
1810.—"The toon, or country mahogany, which comes from Bengal...."—Maria Graham, 101.
1837.—"Rosellini informs us that there is an Egyptian harp at Florence, of which the wood is what is commonly called E. Indian mahogany (Athenaeum, July 22, 1837). This may be the Cedrela Toona."—Royle's Hindu Medicine, 30.
TOORKEY, s. A Turkī horse, i.e. from Turkestan. Marco Polo uses what is practically the same word for a horse from the Turcoman horse-breeders of Asia Minor.
[c. 1590.—"The fourth class (Turkí) are horses imported from Turán; though strong and well formed, they do not come up to the preceding (Arabs, Persian, Mujannas)."—Āīn, i. 234.
[1663.—"If they are found to be Turki horses, that is from Turkistan or Tartary, and of a proper size and adequate strength, they are branded on the thigh with the King's mark...."—Bernier, ed. Constable, 243.]
1678.—"Four horses bought for the Company—
| Pagodas. | |
| One young Arab at | 160 |
| One old Turkey at | 40 |
| One old Atchein at | 20 |
| One of this country at | 20 |
| 240." | |
| Ft. St. Geo. Consns., March 6, in Notes and Exts., Madras, 1871. | |
1782.—"Wanted one or two Tanyans (see TANGUN) rising six years old, Wanted also a Bay Toorkey, or Bay Tazzi (see TAZEE) Horse for a Buggy...."—India Gazette, Feb. 9.
TOOTNAGUE, s. Port. tutenaga. This word appears to have two different applications. a. A Chinese alloy of copper, zinc, and nickel, sometimes called 'white copper' (i.e. peh-tung of the Chinese). The finest qualities are alleged to contain arsenic.[10] The best comes from Yunnan, and Mr. Joubert of the Garnier Expedition, came to the conclusion that it was produced by a direct mixture of the ores in the furnace (Voyage d'Exploration, ii. 160). b. It is used in Indian trade in the same loose way that spelter is used, for either zinc or pewter (peh-yuen, or 'white lead' of the Chinese). The base of the word is no doubt the Pers. tūtiya, Skt. tuttha, an oxide of zinc, generally in India applied to blue vitriol or sulphate of copper, but the formation of the word is obscure. Possibly the last syllable is merely an adjective affix, in which way nāk is used in Persian. Or it may be nāga in the sense of lead, which is one of the senses given by Shakespear. In one of the quotations given below, tutenague is confounded with calin (see CALAY). Moodeen Sheriff gives as synonyms for zinc, Tam. tuttanāgam [tuttunāgam], Tel. tuttunāgam [tuttināgamu], Mahr. and Guz. tutti-nāga. Sir G. Staunton is curiously wrong in supposing (as his mode of writing seems to imply) that tutenague is a Chinese word. [The word has been finally corrupted in England into 'tooth and egg' metal, as in a quotation below.]
1644.—"That which they export (from Cochin to Orissa) is pepper, although it is prohibited, and all the drugs of the south, with Callaym (see CALAY), Tutunaga, wares of China and Portugal; jewelled ornaments; but much less nowadays, for the reasons already stated...."—Bocarro, MS. f. 316.
1675.—"... from thence with Dollars to China for Sugar, Tea, Porcelane, Laccared Ware, Quicksilver, Tuthinag, and Copper...."—Fryer, 86.
[1676-7.—"... supposing yor Honr may intend to send ye Sugar, Sugar-candy, and Tutonag for Persia...."—Forrest, Bombay Letters, Home Series, i. 125.]
1679.—Letter from Dacca reporting ... "that Dacca is not a good market for Gold, Copper, Lead, Tin or Tutenague."—Ft. St. Geo. Consns., Oct. 31, in Notes and Exts. Madras, 1871.
[ " "In the list of commodities brought from the East Indies, 1678, I find among the drugs, tincal (see TINCALL) and Toothanage set doune. Enquire also what these are...."—Letter of Sir T. Browne, May 29, in N. & Q. 2 ser. vii. 520.]
1727.—"Most of the Spunge in China had pernicious Qualities because the Subterraneous Grounds were stored with Minerals, as Copper, Quicksilver, Allom, Toothenague, &c."—A. Hamilton, ii. 223; [ed. 1744, ii. 222, for "Spunge" reading "Springs"].
1750.—"A sort of Cash made of Toothenague is the only Currency of the Country."—Some Ac. of Cochin China, by Mr. Robert Kirsop, in Dalrymple, Or. Rep. i. 245.
[1757.—Speaking of the freemen enrolled at Nottingham in 1757, Bailey (Annals of Nottinghamshire, iii. 1235) mentions as one of them William Tutin, buckle-maker, and then goes on to say: "It was a son of this latter person who was the inventor of that beautiful composite white metal, the introduction of which created such a change in numerous articles of ordinary table service in England. This metal, in honour of the inventor, was called Tutinic, but which word, by one of the most absurd perversions of language ever known, became transferred into 'Tooth and Egg,' the name by which it was almost uniformly recognised in the shops."—Quoted in 2 ser. N. & Q. x. 144.]
1780.—"At Quedah, there is a trade for calin (see CALAY) or tutenague ... to export to different parts of the Indies."—Dunn, New Directory, 5th ed. 338.
1797.—"Tu-te-nag is, properly speaking, zinc, extracted from a rich ore or calamine; the ore is powdered and mixed with charcoal dust, and placed in earthen jars over a slow fire, by means of which the metal rises in form of vapour, in a common distilling apparatus, and afterwards is condensed in water."—Staunton's Acct. of Lord Macartney's Embassy, 4to ed. ii. 540.
TOPAZ, TOPASS, &c., s. A name used in the 17th and 18th centuries for dark-skinned or half-caste claimants of Portuguese descent, and Christian profession. Its application is generally, though not universally, to soldiers of this class, and it is possible that it was originally a corruption of Pers. (from Turkish) top-chī, 'a gunner.' It may be a slight support to this derivation that Italians were employed to cast guns for the Zamorin at Calicut from a very early date in the 16th century, and are frequently mentioned in the annals of Correa between 1503 and 1510. Various other etymologies have however been given. That given by Orme below (and put forward doubtfully by Wilson) from topī, 'a hat,' has a good deal of plausibility, and even if the former etymology be the true origin, it is probable that this one was often in the minds of those using the term, as its true connotation. It may have some corroboration not only in the fact that Europeans are to this day often spoken of by natives (with a shade of disparagement) as Topeewalas (q.v.) or 'Hat-men,' but also in the pride commonly taken by all persons claiming European blood in wearing a hat; indeed Fra Paolino tells us that this class call themselves gente de chapeo (see also the quotation below from Ovington). Possibly however this was merely a misrendering of topaz from the assumed etymology. The same Fra Paolino, with his usual fertility in error, propounds in another passage that topaz is a corruption of do-bhāshiya, 'two-tongued' (in fact is another form of Dubash, q.v.), viz. using Portuguese and a debased vernacular (pp. 50 and 144). [The Madras Gloss. assumes Mal. tópáshi to be a corruption of dubash.] The Topaz on board ship is the sweeper, who is at sea frequently of this class.
[1672.—"Toepasses." See under MADRAS.]
1673.—"To the Fort then belonged 300 English, and 400 Topazes, or Portugal Firemen."—Fryer, 66. In his glossarial Index he gives "Topazes, Musketeers."
1680.—"It is resolved and ordered to entertain about 100 Topasses, or Black Portuguese, into pay."—In Wheeler, i. 121.
1686.—"It is resolved, as soon as English soldiers can be provided sufficient for the garrison, that all Topasses be disbanded, and no more entertained, since there is little dependence on them."—In ditto, 159.
1690.—"A Report spread abroad, that a Rich Moor Ship belonging to one Abdal Ghaford, was taken by Hat-men, that is, in their (the Moors) Dialect, Europeans."—Ovington, 411.
1705.—"... Topases, qui sont des gens du pais qu'on élève et qu'on habille à la Françoise, lesquels ont esté instruits dans la Religion Catholique par quelques uns de nos Missionnaires."—Luillier, 45-46.
1711.—"The Garrison consists of about 250 Soldiers, at 91 Fanhams, or 1l. 2s. 9d. per Month, and 200 Topasses, or black Mungrel Portuguese, at 50, or 52 Fanhams per Month."—Lockyer, 14.
1727.—"Some Portuguese are called Topasses ... will be served by none but Portuguese Priests, because they indulge them more and their Villany."—A. Hamilton, [ed. 1744, i. 326].
1745.—"Les Portugais et les autres Catholiques qu'on nomme Mestices (see MUSTEES) et Topases, également comme les naturels du Pays y viennent sans distinction pour assister aux Divins mystères."—Norbert, ii. 31.
1747.—"The officers upon coming in report their People in general behaved very well, and could not do more than they did with such a handful of men against the Force the Enemy had, being as they believe at least to be one thousand Europeans, besides Topasses, Coffrees (see CAFFER), and Seapoys (see SEPOY), altogether about Two Thousand (2000)."—MS. Consns. at Ft. St. David, March 1. (In India Office).
1749.—"600 effective Europeans would not have cost more than that Crowd of useless Topasses and Peons of which the Major Part of our Military has of late been composed."—In A Letter to a Proprietor of the E.I. Co. p. 57.
" "The Topasses of which the major Part of the Garrison consisted, every one that knows Madrass knows it to be a black, degenerate, wretched Race of the antient Portuguese, as proud and bigotted as their Ancestors, lazy, idle, and vitious withal, and for the most Part as weak and feeble in Body as base in Mind, not one in ten possessed of any of the necessary Requisites of a Soldier."—Ibid. App. p. 103.
1756.—"... in this plight, from half an hour after eleven till near two in the morning, I sustained the weight of a heavy man, with his knees on my back, and the pressure of his whole body on my head; a Dutch sergeant, who had taken his seat upon my left shoulder, and a Topaz bearing on my right."—Holwell's Narr. of the Black Hole, [ed. 1758, p. 19].
1758.—"There is a distinction said to be made by you ... which, in our opinion, does no way square with rules of justice and equity, and that is the exclusion of Portuguese topasses, and other Christian natives, from any share of the money granted by the Nawab."—Court's Letter, in Long, 133.
c. 1785.—"Topasses, black foot soldiers, descended from Portuguese marrying natives, called topasses because they wear hats."—Carraccioli's Clive, iv. 564. The same explanation in Orme, i. 80.
1787.—"... Assuredly the mixture of Moormen, Rajahpoots, Gentoos, and Malabars in the same corps is extremely beneficial.... I have also recommended the corps of Topasses or descendants of Europeans, who retain the characteristic qualities of their progenitors."—Col. Fullarton's View of English Interests in India, 222.
1789.—"Topasses are the sons of Europeans and black women, or low Portuguese, who are trained to arms."—Munro, Narr. 321.
1817.—"Topasses, or persons whom we may denominate Indo-Portuguese, either the mixed produce of Portuguese and Indian parents, or converts to the Portuguese, from the Indian, faith."—J. Mill, Hist. iii. 19.
TOPE, s. This word is used in three quite distinct senses, from distinct origins.
a. Hind. top, 'a cannon.' This is Turkish tōp, adopted into Persian and Hindustani. We cannot trace it further. [Mr. Platts regards T. tob, top, as meaning originally 'a round mass,' from Skt. stūpa, for which see below.]
b. A grove or orchard, and in Upper India especially a mango-orchard. The word is in universal use by the English, but is quite unknown to the natives of Upper India. It is in fact Tam. tōppu, Tel. tōpu, [which the Madras Gloss. derives from Tam. togu, 'to collect,'] and must have been carried to Bengal by foreigners at an early period of European traffic. But Wilson is curiously mistaken in supposing it to be in common use in Hindustan by natives. The word used by them is bāgh.
c. An ancient Buddhist monument in the form of a solid dome. The word tōp is in local use in the N.W. Punjab, where ancient monuments of this kind occur, and appears to come from Skt. stūpa through the Pali or Prakrit thūpo. According to Sir H. Elliot (i. 505), Stupa in Icelandic signifies 'a Tower.' We cannot find it in Cleasby. The word was first introduced to European knowledge by Mr. Elphinstone in his account of the Tope of Manikyala in the Rawul Pindi district.
a.—
b.—
" "The Country is Sandy; yet plentiful in Provisions; in all places, Tops of Trees."—Ibid. 41.
1747.—"The Topes and Walks of Trees in and about the Bounds will furnish them with firewood to burn, and Clay for Bricks is almost everywhere."—Report of a Council of War at Ft. St. David, in Consns. of May 5, MS. in India Office.
1754.—"A multitude of People set to the work finished in a few days an entrenchment, with a stout mud wall, at a place called Facquire's Tope, or the grove of the Facquire."—Orme, i. 273.
1799.—"Upon looking at the Tope as I came in just now, it appeared to me, that when you get possession of the bank of the Nullah, you have the Tope as a matter of course."—Wellington, Desp. i. 23.
1809.—"... behind that a rich country, covered with rice fields and topes."—Ld. Valentia, i. 557.
1814.—"It is a general practice when a plantation of mango trees is made, to dig a well on one side of it. The well and the tope are married, a ceremony at which all the village attends, and large sums are often expended."—Forbes, Or. Mem. iii. 56.c.—
TOPE-KHANA, s. The Artillery, Artillery Park, or Ordnance Department, Turco-Pers. tōp-khāna, 'cannon-house' or 'cannon-department.' The word is the same that appears so often in reports from Constantinople as the Tophaneh. Unless the traditions of Donna Tofana are historical, we are strongly disposed to suspect that Aqua Tofana may have had its name from this word.
1726.—"Isfandar Chan, chief of the Artillery (called the Daroger (see DAROGA) of the Topscanna)."—Valentijn, iv. (Suratte), 276.
1765.—"He and his troops knew that by the treachery of the Tope Khonnah Droger (see DAROGA), the cannon were loaded with powder only."—Holwell, Hist. Events, &c. i. 96.
TOPEE, s. A hat, Hind. ṭopī. This is sometimes referred to Port. topo, 'the top' (also tope, 'a top-knot,' and topete, a 'toupee'), which is probably identical with English and Dutch top, L. German topp, Fr. topet, &c. But there is also a simpler Hind. word ṭop, for a helmet or hat, and the quotation from the Roteiro Vocabulary seems to show that the word existed in India when the Portuguese first arrived. With the usual tendency to specialize foreign words, we find this word becomes specialized in application to the sola hat.
The following expression again, in the same work, seems to be Portuguese, and to refer to some mode in which the women's hair was dressed: "Trazem em a moleera huuns topetes por signall que sam Christãos."—Ibid. 52.
1849.—"Our good friend Sol came down in right earnest on the waste, and there is need of many a fold of twisted muslin round the white topi, to keep off his importunacy."—Dry Leaves from Young Egypt, 2.
1883.—"Topee, a solar helmet."—Wills, Modern Persia, 263.
TOPEEWALA, s. Hind. ṭopīwālā, 'one who wears a hat,' generally a European, or one claiming to be so. Formerly by Englishmen it was habitually applied to the dark descendants of the Portuguese. R. Drummond says that in his time (before 1808) Topeewala and Puggrywala were used in Guzerat and the Mahratta country for 'Europeans' and 'natives.' [The S. Indian form is Toppikār.] The author of the Persian Life of Hydur Naik (Or. Tr. Fund, by Miles) calls Europeans Kalāh-posh, i.e. 'hat-wearers' (p. 85).
[1826.—"It was now evident we should have to encounter the Topee wallas."—Pandurang Hari, ed. 1873, i. 71.]
1874.—"... you will see that he will not be able to protect us. All topiwálás ... are brothers to each other. The magistrates and the judge will always decide in favour of their white brethren."—Govinda Samanta, ii. 211.
TORCULL, s. This word occurs only in Castanheda. It is the Malayālam tiru-koyil, [Tam. tiru, Skt. śri, 'holy' koyil, 'temple']. See i. 253, 254; also the English Trans. of 1582, f. 151. In fact, in the 1st ed. of the 1st book of Castanheda turcoll occurs where pagode is found in subsequent editions. [Tricalore in S. Arcot is in Tam. Tirukkoyilūr, with the same meaning.]
TOSHACONNA, s. P.—H. tosha-khāna. The repository of articles received as presents, or intended to be given as presents, attached to a government-office, or great man's establishment. The tosha-khāna is a special department attached to the Foreign Secretariat of the Government of India.
[1742.—"... the Treasury, Jewels, toishik-khanna ... that belonged to the Emperor...."—Fraser, H. of Nadir Shah, 173.]
1799.—"After the capture of Seringapatam, and before the country was given over to the Raja, some brass swamies (q.v.), which were in the toshekanah were given to the brahmins of different pagodas, by order of Macleod and the General. The prize-agents require payment for them."—Wellington, i. 56.
[1885.—"When money is presented to the Viceroy, he always 'remits' it, but when presents of jewels, arms, stuffs, horses, or other things of value are given him, they are accepted, and are immediately handed over to the tosh khana or Government Treasury...."—Lady Dufferin, Viceregal Life, 75.]
TOSTDAUN, s. Military Hind. tosdān for a cartouche-box. The word appears to be properly Pers. toshadān, 'provision-holder,' a wallet.
TOTY, s. Tam. toṭṭi, Canar. totīga, from Tam. tondu, 'to dig,' properly a low-caste labourer in S. India, and a low-caste man who in villages receives certain allowances for acting as messenger, &c., for the community, like the gorayt of N. India.
TOUCAN, s. This name is very generally misapplied by Europeans to the various species of Hornbill, formerly all styled Buceros, but now subdivided into various genera. Jerdon says: "They (the hornbills) are, indeed, popularly called Toucans throughout India; and this appears to be their name in some of the Malayan isles; the word signifying 'a worker,' from the noise they make." This would imply that the term did originally belong to a species of hornbill, and not to the S. American Rhamphastes or Zygodactyle. Tukang is really in Malay a 'craftsman or artificer'; but the dictionaries show no application to the bird. We have here, in fact, a remarkable instance of the coincidences which often justly perplex etymologists, or would perplex them if it were not so much their habit to seize on one solution and despise the others. Not only is tukang in Malay 'an artificer,' but, as Willoughby tells us, the Spaniards called the real S. American toucan 'carpintero' from the noise he makes. And yet there seems no doubt that Toucan is a Brazilian name for a Brazilian bird. See the quotations, and especially Thevet's, with its date.
The Toucan is described by Oviedo (c. 1535), but he mentions only the name by which "the Christians" called it,—in Ramusio's Italian Picuto (?Beccuto; Sommario, in Ramusio, iii. f. 60). [Prof. Skeat (Concise Dict. s.v.) gives only the Brazilian derivation. The question is still further discussed, without any very definite result, save that it is probably an imitation of the cry of the bird, in N. & Q. 9 ser. vii. 486; viii. 22, 67, 85, 171, 250.]
1648.—"Tucana sive Toucan Brasiliensibus: avis picae aut palumbi magnitudine.... Rostrum habet ingens et nonnumquam palmum longum, exterius flavam.... Mirum est autem videri possit quomodo tantilla avis tam grande rostrum ferat; sed levissimum est."—GeorgI MarcgravI de Liebstad, Hist. Rerum Natur. Brasiliae. Lib. V. cap. xv., in Hist. Natur. Brasil. Lugd. Bat. 1648, p. 217.
See also (1599) Aldrovandus, Ornitholog. lib. xii. cap. 19, where the word is given toucham.Here is an example of misapplication to the Hornbill, though the latter name is also given:
TOWLEEA, s. Hind. tauliyā, 'a towel.' This is a corruption, however, not of the English form, but rather of the Port. toalha (Panjab N. & Q., 1885, ii. 117).
TRAGA, s. [Molesworth gives "S. trāgā, Guz. trāgu"; trāga does not appear in Monier-Williams's Skt. Dict., and Wilson queries the word as doubtful. Dr. Grierson writes: "I cannot trace its origin back to Skt. One is tempted to connect it with the Skt. root trai, or trā, 'to protect,' but the termination gā presents difficulties which I cannot get over. One would expect it to be derived from some Skt. word like trāka, but no such word exists."] The extreme form of dhurna (q.v.) among the Rājputs and connected tribes, in which the complainant puts himself, or some member of his family, to torture or death, as a mode for bringing vengeance on the oppressor. The tone adopted by some persons and papers at the time of the death of the great Charles Gordon, tended to imply their view that his death was a kind of traga intended to bring vengeance on those who had sacrificed him. [For a case in Greece, see Pausanias, X. i. 6. Another name for this self-sacrifice is Chandi, which is perhaps Skt. ćaṇḍa, 'passionate' (see Malcolm, Cent. India, 2nd ed. ii. 137). Also compare the jūhar of the Rājputs (Tod, Annals, Calcutta reprint, i. 74). And for Kūr, see As. Res. iv. 357 seqq.]
1813.—"Every attempt to levy an assessment is succeeded by the Tarakaw, a most horrid mode of murdering themselves and each other."—Forbes, Or. Mem. ii. 91; [2nd ed. i. 378; and see i. 244].
1819.—For an affecting story of Traga, see Macmurdo, in Bo. Lit. Soc. Trans. i. 281.
[TRANKEY, s. A kind of boat used in the Persian Gulf and adjoining seas. All attempts to connect it with any Indian or Persian word have been unsuccessful. It has been supposed to be connected with the Port. trincador, a sort of flat-bottomed coasting vessel with a high stern, and with trinquart, a herring-boat used in the English Channel. Smyth (Sailor's Word-book, s.v.) has: "Trankeh or Trankies, a large boat of the Gulf of Persia." See N. & Q. 8 ser. vii. 167, 376.
[c. 1750.—"... he remained some years in obscurity, till an Arab tranky being driven in there by stress of weather, he made himself known to his countrymen...."—Grose, 1st ed. 25.
[1753.—"Taghi Khan ... soon after embarked a great number of men in small vessels." In the note tarranquins.—Hanway, iv. 181.
[1773.—"Accordingly we resolved to hire one of the common, but uncomfortable vessels of the Gulph, called a Trankey...."—Ives, 203.]
TRANQUEBAR, n.p. A seaport of S. India, which was in the possession of the Danes till 1807, when it was taken by England. It was restored to the Danes in 1814, and purchased from them, along with Serampore, in 1845. The true name is said to be Tarangam-bāḍi, 'Sea-Town' or 'Wave-Town'; [so the Madras Gloss.; but in the Man. (ii. 216) it is interpreted 'Street of the Telegu people.']
TRAVANCORE, n.p. The name of a village south of Trevandrum, from which the ruling dynasty of the kingdom which is known by the name has been called. The true name is said to be Tiru-vidān-koḍu, shortened to Tiruvānkoḍu. [The Madras Gloss. gives Tiruvitānkūr, tiru, Skt. śrī, 'the goddess of prosperity,' vāzhu, 'to reside,' kūr, 'part.']
1553.—"And at the place called Travancor, where this Kingdom of Coulam terminates, there begins another Kingdom, taking its name from this very Travancor, the king of which our people call the Rey Grande, because he is greater in his dominion, and in the state which he keeps, than those other princes of Malabar; and he is subject to the King of Narsinga."—Barros, I. ix. 1.
1609.—"The said Governor has written to me that most of the kings adjacent to our State, whom he advised of the coming of the rebels, had sent replies in a good spirit, with expressions of friendship, and with promises not to admit the rebels into their ports, all but him of Travancor, from whom no answer had yet come."—King of Spain's Letter, in Livros das Monções, p. 257.
TRIBENY, n.p. Skt. tri-veṇī, 'threefold braid'; a name which properly belongs to Prayāga (Allahābād), where the three holy rivers, Ganges, Jumna, and (unseen) Sarasvatī are considered to unite. But local requirements have instituted another Tribeṇī in the Ganges Delta, by bestowing the name of Jumna and Sarasvatī on two streams connected with the Hugli. The Bengal Tribeni gives name to a village, which is a place of great sanctity, and to which the melas or religious fairs attract many visitors.
1705.—"... pendant la Lune de Mars ... il arrive la Fête de Tripigny, c'est un Dieu enfermé dans une maniere de petite Mosquée, qui est dans le milieu d'une tres-grande pleine ... au bord du Gange."—Luillier, 69.
1753.—"Au-dessous de Nudia, à Tripini, dont le nom signifie trois eaux, le Gange fait encore sortir du même côte un canal, qui par sa rentrée, forme une seconde île renfermée dans la première."—D'Anville, 64.
TRICHIES, TRITCHIES, s. The familiar name of the cheroots made at Trichinopoly; long, and rudely made, with a straw inserted at the end for the mouth. They are (or were) cheap and coarse, but much liked by those used to them. Mr. C. P. Brown, referring to his etymology of Trichinopoly under the succeeding article, derives the word cheroot from the form of the name which he assigns. But this, like his etymology of the place-name, is entirely wrong (see CHEROOT). Some excellent practical scholars seem to be entirely without the etymological sense.
TRICHINOPOLY, n.p. A district and once famous rock-fort of S. India. The etymology and proper form of the name has been the subject of much difference. Mr. C. P. Brown gives the true name as Chiruta-paḷḷi, 'Little-Town.' But this may be safely rejected as mere guess, inconsistent with facts. The earliest occurrence of the name on an inscription is (about 1520) as Tiru-śśilla-paḷḷi, apparently 'Holy-rock-town.' In the Tevāram the place is said to be mentioned under the name of Sirapalli. Some derive it from Tri-sira-puram, 'Three-head-town,' with allusion to a 'three-headed demon.' [The Madras Gloss. gives Tiruććināppalli, tiru, 'holy,' shina, 'the plant cissampelos pareira, L. palli, 'village.']
1741.—"The Maratas concluded the campaign by putting this whole Peninsula under contribution as far as C. Cumerim, attacking, conquering, and retaining the city of Tiruxerapali, capital of Madura, and taking prisoner the Nabab who governed it."—Report of the Port. Viceroy, in Bosquejo das Possessões, &c., Documentos, ed. 1853, iii. 19.
1753.—"Ces embouchûres sont en grand nombre, vû la division de ce fleuve en différens bras ou canaux, à remonter jusqu'à Tirishirapali, et à la pagode de Shirangham."—D'Anville, 115.
1761.—"After the battle Mahommed Ali Khan, son of the late nabob, fled to Truchinapolli, a place of great strength."—Complete Hist. of the War in India, 1761, p. 3.
TRINCOMALEE, n.p. A well-known harbour on the N.E. coast of Ceylon. The proper name is doubtful. It is alleged to be Tirukko-nātha-malai, or Taranga-malai. The last ('Sea-Hill') seems conceived to fit our modern pronunciation, but not the older forms. It is perhaps Tri-kona-malai, for 'Three-peak Hill.' There is a shrine of Siva on the hill, called Trikoneśwara; [so the Madras Man. (ii. 216)].
1602.—"This Prince having departed, made sail, and was driven by the winds unknowing whither he went. In a few days he came in sight of a desert island (being that of Ceilon), where he made the land at a haven called Preaturé, between Triquillimalé and the point of Jafanapatam."—Couto, V. i. 5.
1672.—"Trinquenemale hath a surpassingly fine harbour, as may be seen from the draught thereof, yea one of the best and largest in all Ceylon, and better sheltered from the winds than the harbours of Belligamme, Gale, or Colombo."—Baldaeus, 413.
1675.—"The Cinghalese themselves oppose this, saying that they emigrated from another country ... that some thousand years ago, a Prince of great piety, driven out of the land of Tanassery ... came to land near the Hill of Tricoenmale with 1800 or 2000 men...."—Ryklof van Goens, in Valentijn (Ceylon), 210.
1685.—"Triquinimale...."—Ribeyro, Fr. Tr. 6.
1726.—"Trinkenemale, properly Tricoenmale" (i.e. Trikunmalê).—Valentijn (Ceylon), 19.
" "Trinkemale...."—Ibid. 103.
1727.—"... that vigilant Dutchman was soon after them with his Fleet, and forced them to fight disadvantageously in Trankamalaya Bay, wherein the French lost one half of their Fleet, being either sunk or burnt."—A. Hamilton, i. 343, [ed. 1744].
1761.—"We arrived at Trinconomale in Ceylone (which is one of the finest, if not ye best and most capacious Harbours in ye World) the first of November, and employed that and part of the ensuing Month in preparing our Ships for ye next Campaign."—MS. Letter of James Rennell, Jan. 31.
TRIPANG, s. The sea-slug. This is the Malay name, trīpang, tĕrīpang. See SWALLOW, and BECHE-DE-MER.
TRIPLICANE, n.p. A suburb of Fort St. George; the part where the palace of the "Nabob of the Carnatic" is. It has been explained, questionably, as Tiru-valli-kēḍi, 'sacred-creeper-tank.' Seshagiri Sastri gives it as Tiru-alli-kēni, 'sacred lily- (Nymphaea rubea) tank,' [and so the Madras Gloss. giving the word as Tiruvallikkéni.]
1679.—"The Didwan (Dewaun) from Conjeveram, who pretends to have come from Court, having sent word from Treplicane that unless the Governor would come to the garden by the river side to receive the Phyrmaund he would carry it back to Court again, answer is returned that it hath not been accustomary for the Governours to go out to receive a bare Phyrmaund except there come therewith a Serpow (see SEERPAW) or a Tasheriff" (see TASHREEF).—Do., do., Dec. 2. Ibid. 1873, No. III. p. 40.
[1682-4.—"Triblicane, Treblicane Trivety."—Diary Ft. St. Geo. ed. Pringle, i. 63; iii. 154.]
TRIVANDRUM, n.p. The modern capital of the State now known as Travancore (q.v.) Properly Tiru-(v)anantā-puram, 'Sacred Vishnu-Town.'
TRUMPÁK, n.p. This is the name by which the site of the native suburb of the city of Ormus on the famous island of that name is known. The real name is shown by Lt. Stiffe's account of that island (Geogr. Mag. i. 13) to have been Tūrūn-bāgh, 'Garden of Tūrūn,' and it was properly the palace of the old Kings, of whom more than one bore the name of Tūrūn or Tūrūn Shāh.
" "Meanwhile the Captain-Major ordered Afonso Lopes de Costa and João da Nova, and Manuel Teles with his people to proceed along the water's edge, whilst he with all the rest of the force would follow, and come to a place called Turumbaque, which is on the water's edge, in which there were some palm-trees, and wells of brackish water, which supplied the people of the city with drink when the water-boats were not arriving, as sometimes happened owing to a contrary wind."—Correa, i. 830.
1610.—"The island has no fresh water ... only in Torunpaque, which is a piece of white salt clay, at the extremity of the island, there is a well of fresh water, of which the King and the Wazir take advantage, to water the gardens which they have there, and which produce perfectly everything which is planted."—Teixeira, Rel. de los Reyes de Harmuz, 115.
1682.—"Behind the hills, to the S.S.W. and W.S.W. there is another part of the island, lying over against the anchorage that we have mentioned, and which includes the place called Turumbake ... here one sees the ancient pleasure-house of the old Kings of Ormus, with a few small trees, and sundry date-palms. There are also here two great wells of water, called after the name of the place, 'The Wells of Turumbake'; which water is the most wholesome and the freshest in the whole island."—Nieuhof, Zee en Lant-Reize, ii. 86.
TUAN, s. Malay tuan and tuwan, 'lord, master.' The word is used in the English and Dutch settlements of the Archipelago exactly as sahib is in India. [An early Chinese form of the word is referred to under SUMATRA.]
1553.—"For where this word Raja is used, derived from the kingly title, it attaches to a person on whom the King bestows the title, almost as among us that of Count, whilst the style Tuam is like our Dom; only the latter of the two is put before the person's proper name, whilst the former is put after it, as we see in the names of these two Javanese, Vtimuti Raja, and Tuam Colascar."—Barros, II. vi. 3.
[1893.—"... the cooly talked over the affairs of the Tuan Ingris (English gentleman) to a crowd of natives."—W. B. Worsfold, A Visit to Java, 145.]
TUCKA, s. Hind. ṭakā, Beng. ṭākā, [Skt. ṭankaka, 'stamped silver money']. This is the word commonly used among Bengalis for a rupee. But in other parts of India it (or at least ṭakā) is used differently; as for aggregates of 4, or of 2 pice (generally in N.W.P. pānch ṭakā paisā = five ṭakā of pice, 20 pice). Compare TANGA.
1874.—"'... How much did my father pay for her?'
"'He paid only ten tákás.'
"I may state here that the word rupeyá, or as it is commonly written rupee or rupi, is unknown to the peasantry of Bengal, at least to Bengali Hindu peasants; the word they invariably use is táká."—Govinda Samanta, i. 209.
TUCKÁVEE, s. Money advanced to a ryot by his superior to enable him to carry on his cultivation, and recoverable with his quota of revenue. It is Ar.—H. taḳāvī, from Ar. ḳavī, 'strength,' thus literally 'a reinforcement.'
TUCKEED, s. An official reminder. Ar.—H. tākīd, 'emphasis, injunction,' and verb tākīd karnā, 'to enjoin stringently, to insist.'
[TUCKIAH, s. Pers. takya, literally 'a pillow or cushion'; but commonly used in the sense of a hut or hermitage occupied by a fakīr or holy man.
TULWAUR, s. Hind. talwār and tarwār, 'a sabre.' Williams gives Skt. taravāri and tarabālika. ["Talwār is a general term applied to shorter or more or less curved side-arms, while those that are lighter and shorter still are often styled nimchas" (Sir W. Elliot, in Ind. Antiq. xv. 29). Also see Egerton, Handbook, 138.]
[1829.—"... the panchās huzār turwar Rahtorān, meaning the 'fifty thousand Rahtore swords,' is the proverbial phrase to denote the muster of Maroo...."—Tod, Annals, Calcutta reprint, ii. 179.]
1853.—"The old native officer who carried the royal colour of the regiments was cut down by a blow of a Sikh tulwar."—Oakfield, ii. 78.
TUMASHA, s. An entertainment, a spectacle (in the French sense), a popular excitement. It is Ar. tamāshi, 'going about to look at anything entertaining.' The word is in use in Turkestan (see Schuyler, below).
1631.—"Hic quoque meridiem prospicit, ut spectet Thamasham id est pugnas Elephantum Leonum Buffalorum et aliarum ferarum...."—De Laet, De Imperio Magni Mogolis, 127. (For this quotation I am indebted to a communication from Mr. Archibald Constable of the Oudh and Rohilkund Railway.—Y.)
1673.—"... We were discovered by some that told our Banyan ... that two Englishmen were come to the Tomasia, or Sight...."—Fryer, 159.
1705.—"Tamachars. Ce sont des réjouissances que les Gentils font en l'honneur de quelqu'unes de leurs divinitez."—Luillier, Tab. des Matières.
1840.—"Runjeet replied, 'Don't go yet; I am going myself in a few days, and then we will have burra tomacha.'"—Osborne, Court and Camp of Runjeet Singh, 120-121.
1876.—"If you told them that you did not want to buy anything, but had merely come for tomasha, or amusement, they were always ready to explain and show you everything you wished to see."—Schuyler's Turkistan, i. 176.
TUMLET, s. Domestic Hind. tāmlet, being a corruption of tumbler.
TUMLOOK, n.p. A town, and anciently a sea-port and seat of Buddhist learning on the west of the Hoogly near its mouth, formerly called Tāmralipti or -lipta. It occurs in the Mahābhārata and many other Sanskrit words. "In the Dasa Kumāra and Vrihat Katha, collections of tales written in the 9th and 12th centuries, it is always mentioned as a great port of Bengal, and the seat of an active and flourishing commerce with the countries and islands of the Bay of Bengal, and the Indian Ocean" (Prof. H. H. Wilson, in J. R. As. Soc. v. 135). [Also see Cunningham, Anct. Geog. p. 504.]
"... καὶ πρὸς αὐτῷ τῷ ποταμῷ (Γάγγῃ) πολείς·
* * * *
Παλιμβοθρα βασιλειον
Ταμαλιτης."
—Ptolemy's Tables, Bk. VII. i. 73.
c. 410.—"From this, continuing to go eastward nearly 50 yôjanas, we arrive at the Kingdom of Tamralipti. Here it is the river (Ganges) empties itself into the sea. Fah Hian remained here for two years, writing out copies of the Sacred Books.... He then shipped himself on board a great merchant vessel...."—Beal, Travels of Fah Hian, &c. (1869), pp. 147-148.
[c. 1070.—"... a merchant named Harshagupta, who had arrived from Tamralipti, having heard of that event, came there full of curiosity."—Tawney, Katha Sarit Sāgara, i. 329.]
1679.—In going down the Hoogly:
"Before daybreak overtook the Ganges at Barnagur, met the Arrival 7 days out from Ballasore, and at night passed the Lilly at Tumbalee."—Ft. St. Geo. (Council on Tour). In Notes & Exts. No. II. p. 69.
1685.—"January 2.—We fell downe below Tumbolee River.
"January 3.—We anchored at the Channel Trees, and lay here ye 4th and 5th for want of a gale to carry us over to Kedgeria."—Hedges, Diary, Hak. Soc. i. 175.
[1694.—"The Royal James and Mary ... fell on a sand on this side Tumbolee point...."—Birdwood, Report on Old Records, 90.]
1726.—"Tamboli and Banzia are two Portuguese villages, where they have their churches, and salt business."—Valentijn, v. 159.
[1753.—"Tombali." See under KEDGEREE.]
TUMTUM, s. A dog-cart. We do not know the origin. [It is almost certainly a corr. of English tandem, the slang use of which in the sense of a conveyance (according to the Stanf. Dict.) dates from 1807. Even now English-speaking natives often speak of a dog-cart with a single horse as a tandem.]
TUNCA, TUNCAW, &c., s. P.—H. tankhwāh, pron. tankhā. Properly an assignment on the revenue of a particular locality in favour of an individual; but in its most ordinary modern sense it is merely a word for the wages of a monthly servant. For a full account of the special older uses of the word see Wilson. In the second quotation the use is obscure; perhaps it means the villages on which assignments had been granted.
1760.—"You have been under the necessity of writing to Mr. Holwell (who was sent to collect in the tuncars).... The low men that are employed in the tuncars are not to be depended on."—The Nawab to the Prest. and Council of Ft. Wm., in Long, 233.
1778.—"These rescripts are called tuncaws, and entitle the holder to receive to the amount from the treasuries ... as the revenues come in."—Orme, ii. 276.
[1823.—"The Grassiah or Rajpoot chiefs ... were satisfied with a fixed and known tanka, or tribute from certain territories, on which they had a real or pretended claim."—Malcolm, Cent. India, 2nd. ed. i. 385.
[1851.—"The Sikh detachments ... used to be paid by tunkhwáhs, or assignments of the provincial collectors of revenue."—Edwardes, A Year on the Punjab Frontier, i. 19.]
TURA, s. Or. Turk. tūra. This word is used in the Autobiography of Baber, and in other Mahommedan military narratives of the 16th century. It is admitted by the translators of Baber that it is rendered by them quite conjecturally, and we cannot but think that they have missed the truth. The explanation of tūr which they quote from Meninski is "reticulatus," and combining this with the manner in which the quotations show these tūra to have been employed, we cannot but think that the meaning which best suits is 'a gabion.' Sir H. Elliot, in referring to the first passage from Baber, adopts the reading tūbra, and says: "Túbras are nose-bags, but ... Badáúni makes the meaning plain, by saying that they were filled with earth (Táríkh-i-Badáúni, f. 136).... The sacks used by Sher Sháh as temporary fortifications on his march towards Rájpútána were túbras" (Elliot, vi. 469). It is evident, however, that Baber's tūras were no tobras, whilst a reference to the passage (Elliot, iv. 405) regarding Sher Shāh shows that the use of bags filled with sand on that occasion was regarded as a new contrivance. The tūbra of Badáúni may therefore probably be a misreading; whilst the use of gabions implies necessarily that they would be filled with earth.
TURAKA, n.p. This word is applied both in Mahratti and in Telugu to the Mahommedans (Turks). [The usual form in the inscriptions is Turushka (see Bombay Gazetteer, i. pt. i. 189).] Like this is Tarūk (see TAROUK) which the Burmese now apply to the Chinese.
TURBAN, s. Some have supposed this well-known English word to be a corruption of the P.—H. sirband, 'head-wrap,' as in the following:
This, however, is quite inconsistent with the history of the word. Wedgewood's suggestion that the word may be derived from Fr. turbin, 'a whelk,' is equally to be rejected. It is really a corruption of one which, though it seems to be out of use in modern Turkish, was evidently used by the Turks when Europe first became familiar with the Ottomans and their ways. This is set forth in the quotation below from Zedler's Lexicon, which is corroborated by those from Rycaut and from Galland, &c. The proper word was apparently dulband. Some modern Persian dictionaries give the only meaning of this as 'a sash.' But Meninski explains it as 'a cloth of fine white muslin; a wrapper for the head'; and Vüllers also gives it this meaning, as well as that of a 'sash or belt.'[11] In doing so he quotes Shakespear's Dict., and marks the use as 'Hindustani-Persian.' But a merely Hindustani use of a Persian word could hardly have become habitual in Turkey in the 15th and 16th centuries. The use of dulband for a turban was probably genuine Persian, adopted by the Turks. Its etymology is apparently from Arab. dul, 'volvere,' admitting of application to either a girdle or a head-wrap. From the Turks it passed in the forms Tulipant, Tolliban, Turbant, &c., into European languages. And we believe that the flower tulip also has its name from its resemblance to the old Ottoman turban, [a view accepted by Prof. Skeat (Concise Dict. s.v. tulip, turban)].[12]
c. 1490.—"Estradiots sont gens comme Genetaires: vestuz, à pied et à cheval, comme les Turcs, sauf la teste, où ils ne portent ceste toille qu'ils appellent tolliban, et sont durs gens, et couchent dehors tout l'an et leurs chevaulx."—Ph. de Commynes, Liv. VIII. ch. viii. ed. Dupont (1843), ii. 456. Thus given in Danett's translation (1595): "These Estradiots are soldiers like to the Turkes Ianizaries, and attired both on foote and on horsebacke like to the Turks, save that they weare not vpon their head such a great roule of linnen as the Turkes do called (sic) Tolliban."—p. 325.
1586-8.—"... the King's Secretarie, who had upon his head a peece of died linen cloth folded vp like vnto a Turkes Tuliban."—Voyage of Master Thomas Candish, in Hakl. iv. 33.
1588.—"In this canoa was the King's Secretarie, who had on his head a piece of died linen cloth folded vp like vnto a Turkes Tuliban."—Cavendish, ibid. iv. 337.
c. 1610.—"... un gros turban blanc à la Turque."—Pyrard de Laval, i. 98; [Hak. Soc. i. 132 and 165].
1611.—Cotgrave's French Dict. has: "Toliban: m. A Turbant or Turkish hat.
"Tolopan, as Turbant.
"Turban: m. A Turbant; a Turkish hat, of white and fine linnen wreathed into a rundle; broad at the bottom to enclose the head, and lessening, for ornament, towards the top."
1615.—"... se un Cristiano fosse trovato con turbante bianco in capo, sarebbe perciò costretto o a rinegare o a morire. Questo turbante poi lo portano Turchi, di varie forme."—P. della Valle, i. 96.
1615.—"The Sultan of Socotora ... his clothes are Surat Stuffes, after the Arabs manner ... a very good Turbant, but bare footed."—Sir T. Roe, [Hak. Soc. i. 32].
" "Their Attire is after the Turkish fashion, Turbants only excepted, insteed whereof they have a kind of Capp, rowled about with a black Turbant."—De Monfart, 5.
1619.—"Nel giorno della qual festa tutti Persiani più spensierati, e fin gli uomini grandi, e il medesimo rè, si vestono in abito succinto all uso di Mazanderan; e con certi berrettini, non troppo buoni, in testa, perchè i turbanti si guasterebbono e sarebbero di troppo impaccio...."—P. della Valle, ii. 31; [Hak. Soc. comp. i. 43].
1630.—"Some indeed have sashes of silke and gold, tulipanted about their heads...."—Sir T. Herbert, p. 128.
" "His way was made by 30 gallant young gentlemen vested in crimson saten; their Tulipants were of silk and silver wreath'd about with cheynes of gold."—Ibid. p. 139.
1672.—"On the head they wear great Tulbands (Tulbande) which they touch with the hand when they say salam to any one."—Baldaeus (Germ. version), 33.
" "Trois Tulbangis venoient de front après luy, et ils portoient chascun un beau tulban orné et enrichy d'aigrettes."—Journ. d'Ant. Galland, i. 139.
1673.—"The mixture of Castes or Tribes of all India are distinguished by the different Modes of binding their Turbats."—Fryer, 115.
1674.—"El Tanadar de un golpo cortò las repetidas bueltas del turbante a un Turco, y la cabeça asta la mitad, de que cayò muerte."—Faria y Sousa, Asia Port. ii. 179-180.
" "Turbant, a Turkish hat," &c.—Glossographia, or a Dictionary interpreting the Hard Words of whatsoever language, now used in our refined English Tongue, &c., the 4th ed., by T.E., of the Inner Temple, Esq. In the Savoy, 1674.
1676.—"Mahamed Alibeg returning into Persia out of India ... presented Cha-Sefi the second with a Coco-nut about the bigness of an Austrich-egg ... there was taken out of it a Turbant that had 60 cubits of calicut in length to make it, the cloath being so fine that you could hardly feel it."—Tavernier, E.T. p. 127; [ed. Ball, ii. 7].
1687.—In a detail of the high officers of the Sultan's Court we find:
"5. The Tulbentar Aga, he that makes up his Turbant."
A little below another personage (apparently) is called Tulban-oghlani ('The Turban Page')—Ricaut, Present State of the Ottoman Empire, p. 14.
1711.—"Their common Dress is a piece of blew Callico, wrap'd in a Role round their Heads for a Turbat."—Lockyer, 57.
1745.—"The Turks hold the Sultan's Turban in honour to such a degree that they hardly dare touch it ... but he himself has, among the servants of his privy chamber, one whose special duty it is to adjust his Turban, or head-tire, and who is thence called Tulbentar or Dulbentar Aga, or Dulbendar Aga, also called by some Dulbend Oghani (Oghlani), or Page of the Turban."—Zedler, Universal Lexicon, s.v.
c. 1760.—"They (the Sepoys) are chiefly armed in the country manner, with sword and target, and wear the Indian dress, the turbant, the cabay (Cabaya) or vest, and long drawers."—Grose, i. 39.
1843.—"The mutiny of Vellore was caused by a slight shown to the Mahomedan turban; the mutiny of Bangalore by disrespect said to have been shown to a Mahomedan place of worship."—Macaulay, Speech on Gates of Somnauth.
TURKEY, s. This fowl is called in Hindustani perū, very possibly an indication that it came to India, perhaps first to the Spanish settlements in the Archipelago, across the Pacific, as the red pepper known as Chili did. In Tamil the bird is called vān-kōṛi, 'great fowl.' Our European names of it involve a complication of mistakes and confusions. We name it as if it came from the Levant. But the name turkey would appear to have been originally applied to another of the Pavonidae, the guinea-fowl, Meleagris of the ancients. Minsheu's explanations (quoted below) show strange confusions between the two birds. The French coq d'Inde or Dindon points only ambiguously to India, but the German Calecutische Hahn and the Dutch Kalkoen (from Calicut) are specific in error as indicating the origin of the Turkey in the East. This misnomer may have arisen from the nearly simultaneous discovery of America and of the Cape route to Calicut, by Spain and Portugal respectively. It may also have been connected with the fact that Malabar produced domestic fowls of extraordinary size. Of these Ibn Batuta (quoted below) makes quaint mention. Zedler's great German Lexicon of Universal Knowledge, a work published as late as 1745, says that these birds (turkeys) were called Calecutische and Indische because they were brought by the Portuguese from the Malabar coast. Dr. Caldwell cites a curious disproof of the antiquity of certain Tamil verses from their containing a simile of which the turkey forms the subject. And native scholars, instead of admitting the anachronism, have boldly maintained that the turkey had always been found in India (Dravidian Gramm. 2nd ed. p. 137). Padre Paolino was apparently of the same opinion, for whilst explaining that the etymology of Calicut is "Castle of the Fowls," he asserts that Turkeys (Galli d'India) came originally from India; being herein, as he often is, positive and wrong. In 1615 we find W. Edwards, the E.I. Co.'s agent at Ajmir, writing to send the Mogul "three or four Turkey cocks and hens, for he hath three cocks but no hens" (Colonial Paper, E. i. c. 388). Here, however, the ambiguity between the real turkey and the guinea-fowl may possibly arise. In Egypt the bird is called Dik-Rūmī, 'fowl of Rūm' (i.e. of Turkey), probably a rendering of the English term.
c. 1550.—"One is a species of peacock that has been brought to Europe, and commonly called the Indian fowl."—Girolamo Benzoni, 148.
1627.—"Turky Cocke, or cocke of India, avis ita dicta, quod ex Africa, et vt nonulli volunt alii, ex India vel Arabia ad nos allata sit. B. Indische haen. T. Indianisch hun, Calecuttisch hun.... H. Pavon de las Indias. G. Poulle d'Inde. H. 2. Gallepauo. L. Gallo-pauo, quod de vtriusque natura videtur participare ... aves Numidicae, à Numidia, Meleagris ... à μέλας, i. niger, and ἄγρος, ager, quod in Æthiopia praecipuè inveniuntur.
"A Turkie, or Ginnie Henne ... I. Gallina d'India. H. Galina Morisca. G. Poulle d'Inde. L. Penélope. Auis Pharaonis. Meleágris....
* * * * *
"A Ginnie cocke or hen: ex Guinea, regione Indica ... vnde fuerunt priùs ad alias regiones transportati. vi. Turkie-cocke or hen."—Minsheu's Guide into Tongues (2d edition).
1623.—"33. Gallus Indicus, aut Turcicus (quem vocant), gallinacei aevum parum superat; iracundus ales, et carnibus valde albis."—Bacon, Hist. Vitae et Mortis, in Montague's ed. x. 140.
1653.—"Les François appellent coq-d'Inde vn oyseau lequel ne se trouue point aux Indes Orientales, les Anglois le nomment turki-koq qui signifie coq de Turquie, quoy qu'il n'y ait point d'autres en Turquie que ceux que l'on y a portez d'Europe. Ie croy que cet oyseau nous est venu de l'Amerique."—De la Boullaye-le-Gouz, ed. 1657, p. 259.
1750-52.—"Some Germans call the turkeys Calcutta hens; for this reason I looked about for them here, and to the best of my remembrance I was told they were foreign."—Olof Toreen, 199-200. We do not know whether the mistake of Calcutta for Calicut belongs to the original author or to the translator—probably to the proverbial traditore.
TURNEE, TUNNEE, s. An English supercargo, Sea-Hind., and probably a corruption of attorney. (Roebuck).
TURPAUL, s. Sea-Hind. A tarpaulin (ibid.). [The word (tārpāl) has now come into common native use.]
TUSSAH, TUSSER, s. A kind of inferior silk, the tissues of which are now commonly exported to England. Anglo-Indians generally regard the termination of this word in r as a vulgarism, like the use of solar for sola (q.v.); but it is in fact correct. For though it is written by Milburn (1813) tusha, and tusseh (ii. 158, 244), we find it in the Āīn-i-Akbarī as tassar, and in Dr. Buchanan as tasar (see below). The term is supposed to be adopted from Skt. tasara, trasara, Hind. tasar, 'a shuttle'; perhaps from the form of the cocoon? The moth whose worm produced this silk is generally identified with Antheraea paphia, but Capt. Hutton has shown that there are several species known as tasar worms. These are found almost throughout the whole extent of the forest tracts of India. But the chief seat of the manufacture of stuffs, wholly or partly of tasar silk, has long been Bhāgalpur on the Ganges. [See also Allen, Mon. on Silk Cloths of Assam, 1899; Yusuf Ali, Silk Fabrics of N.W.P., 1900.] The first mention of tasar in English reports is said to be that by Michael Atkinson of Jangīpūr, as cited below in the Linnæan Transactions of 1804 by Dr. Roxburgh (see Official Report on Sericulture in India, by J. Geoghegan, Calcutta, 1872), [and the elaborate article in Watt, Econ. Dict. vi. pt. iii. 96 seqq.].
[1591.—See the account by Rumphius, quoted by Watt, loc. cit. p. 99.]
1726.—"Tessersse ... 11 ells long and 2 els broad...."—Valentijn, v. 178.
1796.—"... I send you herewith for Dr. Roxburgh a specimen of Bughy Tusseh silk.... There are none of the Palma Christi species of Tusseh to be had here.... I have heard that there is another variation of the Tusseh silk-worm in the hills near Bauglipoor."—Letter of M. Atkinson, as above, in Linn. Trans., 1804, p. 41.
1802.—"They (the insects) are found in such abundance over many parts of Bengal and the adjoining provinces as to have afforded to the natives, from time immemorial, an abundant supply of a most durable, coarse, dark-coloured silk, commonly called Tusseh silk, which is woven into a cloth called Tusseh doot'hies, much worn by Bramins and other sects of Hindoos."—Roxburgh, Ibid. 34.
c. 1809.—"The chief use to which the tree (Terminalia elata, or Asan) is however applied, is to rear the Tasar silk."—Buchanan, Eastern India, ii. 157 seqq.
[1817.—"A thick cloth, called tusuru, is made from the web of the gootee insect in the district of Veerbhoomee."—Ward, Hindoos, 2d ed. i. 85.]
1876.—"The work of the Tussur silk-weavers has so fallen off that the Calcutta merchants no longer do business with them."—Sat. Rev., 14 Oct., p. 468.
TUTICORIN, n.p. A sea-port of Tinnevelly, and long the seat of pearl-fishery, in Tamil Tūttukkuḍi, [which the Madras Gloss. derives from Tam. tūttu, 'to scatter,' kudi, 'habitation']. According to Fra Paolino the name is Tutukodi, 'a place where nets are washed,' but he is not to be trusted. Another etymology alleged is from turu, 'a bush.' But see Bp. Caldwell below.
1610.—"And the said Captain and Auditor shall go into residence every three years, and to him shall pertain all the temporal government, without any intermeddling therein of the members of the Company ... nor shall the said members (religiosos) compel any of the Christians to remain in the island unless it is their voluntary choice to do so, and such as wish it may live at Tuttucorim."—King's Letter, in L. das Monções, 386.
1644.—"The other direction in which the residents of Cochim usually go for their trading purchases is to Tutocorim, on the Fishery Coast (Costa da Pescaria), which gets that name from the pearl which is fished there."—Bocarro, MS.
[c. 1660.—"... musk and porcelain from China, and pearls from Beharen (Bahrein), and Tutucoury, near Ceylon...."—Bernier, ed. Constable, 204.]
1672.—"The pearls are publicly sold in the market at Tutecoryn and at Cailpatnam.... The Tutecorinish and Manaarish pearls are not so good as those of Persia and Ormus, because they are not so free from water or so white."—Baldaeus (Germ. ed.), 145.
1673.—"... Tutticaree, a Portugal Town in time of Yore."—Fryer, 49.
[1682.—"The Agent having notice of an Interloper lying in Titticorin Bay, immediately sent for ye Councell to consult about it."—Pringle, Diary Ft. St. Geo. 1st ser. i. 69.]
1727.—"Tutecareen has a good safe harbour.... This colony superintends a Pearl-Fishery ... which brings the Dutch Company 20,000L. yearly Tribute."—A. Hamilton, i. 334; [ed. 1744, i. 336].
1881.—"The final n in Tuticorin was added for some such euphonic reason as turned Kochchi into Cochin and Kumari into Comorin. The meaning of the name Tūttukkuḍi is said to be 'the town where the wells get filled up'; from tūttu (properly tūrttu), 'to fill up a well,' and kuḍi, 'a place of habitation, a town.' This derivation, whether the true one or not, has at least the merit of being appropriate...."—Bp. Caldwell, Hist. of Tinnevelly, 75.
TYCONNA, TYEKANA, s. A room in the basement or cellarage, or dug in the ground, in which it has in some parts of India been the practice to pass the hottest part of the day during the hottest season of the year. Pers. tah-khāna, 'nether-house,' i.e. 'subterraneous apartment.' ["In the centre of the court is an elevated platform, the roof of a subterraneous chamber called a zeera zemeon, whither travellers retire during the great heats of the summer" (Morier, Journey through Persia, &c., 81). Another name for such a place is sardābeh (Burton, Ar. Nights, i. 314).]
c. 1763.—"The throng that accompanied that minister proved so very great that the floor of the house, which happened to have a Tah-Qhana, and possibly was at that moment under a secret influence, gave way, and the body, the Vizir, and all his company fell into the apartment underneath."—Seir Mutaqherin, iii. 19.
1842.—"The heat at Jellalabad from the end of April was tremendous, 105° to 110° in the shade. Everybody who could do so lived in underground chambers called tykhánás. Broadfoot dates a letter 'from my den six feet under ground.'"—Mrs. Mackenzie, Storms and Sunshine of a Soldier's Life, i. 298. [The same author in her Life in the Mission (i. 330) writes taikhana.]
TUXALL, TAKSAUL, s. The Mint. Hind. ṭaksāl, from Skt. ṭankaśālā, 'coin-hall.'
TYPHOON, s. A tornado or cyclone-wind; a sudden storm, a 'nor-wester' (q.v.). Sir John Barrow (see Autobiog. 57) ridicules "learned antiquarians" for fancying that the Chinese took typhoon from the Egyptian Typhon, the word being, according to him, simply the Chinese syllables, ta-fung, 'Great Wind.' His ridicule is misplaced. With a monosyllabic language like the Chinese (as we have remarked elsewhere) you may construct a plausible etymology, to meet the requirements of the sound alone, from anything and for anything. And as there is no evidence that the word is in Chinese use at all, it would perhaps be as fair a suggestion to derive it from the English "tough 'un." Mr. Giles, who seems to think that the balance of evidence is in favour of this (Barrow's) etymology, admits a serious objection to be that the Chinese have special names for the typhoon, and rarely, if ever, speak of it vaguely as a 'great wind.' The fact is that very few words of the class used by seafaring and trading people, even when they refer to Chinese objects, are directly taken from the Chinese language. E.g. Mandarin, pagoda, chop, cooly, tutenague;—none of these are Chinese. And the probability is that Vasco and his followers got the tufão, which our sailors made into touffon and then into typhoon, as they got the monção which our sailors made into monsoon, direct from the Arab pilots.
The Arabic word is ṭūfān, which is used habitually in India for a sudden and violent storm. Lane defines it as meaning 'an overpowering rain, ... Noah's flood,' etc. And there can be little doubt of its identity with the Greek τυφῶν or τυφών. [But Burton (Ar. Nights, iii. 257) alleges that it is pure Arabic, and comes from the root ṭauf, 'going round.'] This word τυφών (the etymologists say, from τυφώ, 'I raise smoke') was applied to a demon-giant or Titan, and either directly from the etym. meaning or from the name of the Titan (as in India a whirlwind is called 'a Devil or Pisachee') to a 'waterspout,' and thence to analogous stormy phenomena. 'Waterspout' seems evidently the meaning of τυφών in the Meteorologica of Aristotle (γίγνεται μὲν οὖν τυφών ... κ.τ.λ.) iii. 1 (the passage is exceedingly difficult to render clearly); and also in the quotation which we give from Aulus Gellius. The word may have come to the Arabs either in maritime intercourse, or through the translations of Aristotle. It occurs (al-ṭūfān) several times in the Koran; thus in sura, vii. 134, for a flood or storm, one of the plagues of Egypt, and in s. xxix. 14 for the Deluge.
Dr. F. Hirth, again (Journ. R. Geog. Soc. i. 260), advocates the quasi-Chinese origin of the word. Dr. Hirth has found the word T'ai (and also with the addition of fung, 'wind') to be really applied to a certain class of cyclonic winds, in a Chinese work on Formosa, which is a re-issue of a book originally published in 1694. Dr. Hirth thinks t'ai as here used (which is not the Chinese word ta or tai, 'great,' and is expressed by a different character) to be a local Formosan term; and is of opinion that the combination t'ai-fung is "a sound so near that of typhoon as almost to exclude all other conjectures, if we consider that the writers using the term in European languages were travellers distinctly applying it to storms encountered in that part of the China Sea." Dr. Hirth also refers to F. Mendes Pinto and the passages (quoted below) in which he says tufão is the Chinese name for such storms. Dr. Hirth's paper is certainly worthy of much more attention than the scornful assertion of Sir John Barrow, but it does not induce us to change our view as to the origin of typhoon.
Observe that the Port. tufão distinctly represents ṭūfān and not t'ai-fung, and the oldest English form 'tuffon' does the same, whilst it is not by any means unquestionable that these Portuguese and English forms were first applied in the China Sea, and not in the Indian Ocean. Observe also Lord Bacon's use of the word typhones in his Latin below; also that ṭūfān is an Arabic word, at least as old as the Koran, and closely allied in sound and meaning to τυφών, whilst it is habitually used for a storm in Hindustani. This is shown by the quotations below (1810-1836); and Platts defines ṭūfān as "a violent storm of wind and rain, a tempest, a typhoon; a flood, deluge, inundation, the universal deluge" etc.; also ṭūfānī, "stormy, tempestuous ... boisterous, quarrelsome, violent, noisy, riotous."
Little importance is to be attached to Pinto's linguistic remarks such as that quoted, or even to the like dropt by Couto. We apprehend that Pinto made exactly the same mistake that Sir John Barrow did; and we need not wonder at it, when so many of our countrymen in India have supposed hackery to be a Hindustani word, and when we find even the learned H. H. Wilson assuming tope (in the sense of 'grove') to be in native Hindustani use. Many instances of such mistakes might be quoted. It is just possible, though not we think very probable, that some contact with the Formosan term may have influenced the modification of the old English form tuffon into typhoon. It is much more likely to have been influenced by the analogies of monsoon, simoom; and it is quite possible that the Formosan mariners took up their (unexplained) t'ai-fung from the Dutch or Portuguese.
On the origin of the Ar. word the late Prof. Robertson-Smith forwarded the following note:
"Τυφῶν, 'whirlwind, waterspout,' connected with τῦφος seems pure Greek; the combination in Baal-Zephon, Exod. xiv. 2, and Sephóni, the northern one, in Joel, ii. 20, suggested by Hitzig, appears to break down, for there is no proof of any Egyptian name for Set corresponding to Typhon.
"On the other hand Ṭūfān, the deluge, is plainly borrowed from the Aramaic. Tūfān, for Noah's flood, is both Jewish, Aramaic and Syriac, and this form is not borrowed from the Greek, but comes from a true Semitic root ṭūf 'to overflow.'
"But again, the sense of whirlwind is not recognised in classical Arabic. Even Dozy in his dictionary of later Arabic only cites a modern French-Arabic dictionary (Bocthor's) for the sense, Tourbillon, trombe. Bistání in the Moḥít el Moḥít does not give this sense, though he is pretty full in giving modern as well as old words and senses. In Arabic the root ṭūf means: 'to go round,' and a combination of this idea with the sense of sudden disaster might conceivably have given the new meaning to the word. On the other hand it seems simpler to regard this sense as a late loan from some modern form of τυφών, typho, or tifone. But in order finally to settle the matter one wants examples of this sense of ṭūfān."[Prof. Skeat (Concise Dict. s.v.) gives: "Sometimes claimed as a Chinese word meaning 'a great wind' ... but this seems to be a late mystification. In old authors the forms are tuffon, tuffoon, tiphon, &c.—Arab. ṭūfān, a hurricane, storm. Gk. τυφών, better τυφώς, a whirlwind. The close accidental coincidence of these words in sense and form is very remarkable, as Whitney notes."]
1540.—"Now having ... continued our Navigation within this Bay of Cauchin-china ... upon the day of the nativity of our Lady, being the eight of September, for the fear that we were in of the new Moon, during the which there oftentimes happens in this Climate such a terrible storm of wind and rain, as it is not possible for ships to withstand it, which by the Chineses is named Tufan" (o qual tormento os Chins chamão tufão).—Pinto (orig. cap. I.) in Cogan, p. 60.
" "... in the height of forty and one degrees, there arose so terrible a South-wind, called by the Chineses Tufaon (un tempo do Sul, a q̃ Chins chamão tufão)."—Ibid. (cap. lxxix.), in Cogan, p. 97.
1554.—"Não se ouve por pequena maravilha cessarem os tufões na paragem da ilha de Sãchião."—Letter in Sousa, Oriente Conquist. i. 680.
[c. 1554.—"... suddenly from the west arose a great storm known as fil Tofani [literally 'Elephant's flood,' comp. ELEPHANTA, b.]."—Travels of Sidi Ali, Reïs, ed. Vambéry, p. 17.]
1567.—"I went aboorde a shippe of Bengala, at which time it was the yeere of Touffon, concerning which Touffon ye are to vnderstand that in the East Indies often times, there are not stormes as in other countreys; but every 10 or 12 yeeres there are such tempests and stormes that it is a thing incredible ... neither do they know certainly what yeere they will come."—Master Caesar Frederike, in Hakl. ii. 370 [369].
1575.—"But when we approach'd unto it (Cyprus), a Hurricane arose suddenly, and blew so fiercely upon us, that it wound our great Sail round about our main Mast.... These Winds arise from a Wind that is called by the Greeks Typhon; and Pliny calleth it Vertex and Vortex; but as dangerous as they are, as they arise suddenly, so quickly are they laid again also."—Rauwolff's Travels, in Ray's Collection, ed. 1705, p. 320. Here the traveller seems to intimate (though we are not certain) that Typhon was then applied in the Levant to such winds; in any case it was exactly the ṭūfān of India.
1602.—"This Junk seeking to make the port of Chincheo met with a tremendous storm such as the natives call Tufão, a thing so overpowering and terrible, and bringing such violence, such earthquake as it were, that it appears as if all the spirits of the infernal world had got into the waves and seas, driving them in a whirl till their fury seems to raise a scud of flame, whilst in the space of one turning of the sand-glass the wind shall veer round to every point of the compass, seeming to blow more furiously from each in succession.
"Such is this phenomenon that the very birds of heaven, by some natural instinct, know of its coming 8 days beforehand, and are seen to take their nests down from the tree-tops and hide them in crevices of rock. Eight days before, the clouds also are seen to float so low as almost to graze men's heads, whilst in these days the seas seem beaten down as it were, and of a deep blue colour. And before the storm breaks forth, the sky exhibits a token well-known to all, a great object which seamen call the Ox-Eye (Olho de Boi) all of different colours, but so gloomy and appalling that it strikes fear in all who see it. And as the Bow of Heaven, when it appears, is the token of fair weather, and calm, so this seems to portend the Wrath of God, as we may well call such a storm...." &c.—Couto, V. viii. 12.
1610.—"But at the breaking vp, commeth alway a cruell Storme, which they call the Tuffon, fearfull even to men on land; which is not alike extreame euery yeare."—Finch, in Purchas, i. 423.
1613.—"E porque a terra he salitrosa e ventosa, he muy sogeita a tempestades, ora menor aquella chamada Ecnephia (Εκνεφιας), ora maior chamada Tiphon (Τυφων), aquelle de ordinario chamamos Tuphão ou Tormenta desfeita ... e corre com tanta furia e impeto que desfas os tectos das casas e aranca arvores, e as vezes do mar lança as embarcações em terra nos campos do sertão."—Godinho de Eredia, f. 36v.
1615.—"And about midnight Capt. Adams went out in a bark abord the Hozeander with many other barks to tow her in, we fearing a tuffon."—Cocks's Diary, i. 50.
1624.—"3. Typhones majores, qui per latitudinem aliquam corripiunt, et correpta sorbent in sursum, raro fiunt; at vortices, sive turbines exigui et quasi ludicri, frequenter.
"4. Omnes procellae et typhones, et turbines majores, habent manifestum motum praecipitii, aut vibrationis deorsum magis quam alii venti."—Bacon, Hist. Ventorum, in B. Montagu's ed. of Works, x. 49. In the translation by R. G. (1671) the words are rendered "the greater typhones."—Ibid. xiv. 268.
1626.—"Francis Fernandez writeth, that in the way from Malacca to Iapan they are encountred with great stormes which they call Tuffons, that blow foure and twentie houres, beginning from the North to the East, and so about the Compasse."—Purchas, Pilgrimage, 600.
1688.—"Tuffoons are a particular kind of violent Storms blowing on the Coast of Tonquin ... it comes on fierce and blows very violent, at N.E. twelve hours more or less.... When the Wind begins to abate it dies away suddenly, and falling flat calm it continues so an Hour, more or less; then the Wind comes round about to the S.W. and it blows and rains as fierce from thence, as it did before at N.E. and as long."—Dampier, ii. 36.
1712.—"Non v'è spavento paragonabile a quello de' naviganti, quali in mezzo all' oceano assaltati d'ogni intorno da turbini e da tifoni."—P. Paolo Segnero, Mann. dell' Anima, Ottobre 14. (Borrowed from Della Crusca Voc.).
1721.—"I told them they were all strangers to the nature of the Moussoons and Tuffoons on the coast of India and China."—Shelvocke's Voyage, 383.
1727.—"... by the Beginning of September, they reacht the Coast of China, where meeting with a Tuffoon, or a North East Storm, that often blows violently about that Season, they were forced to bear away for Johore."—A. Hamilton, ii. 89; [ed. 1744, ii. 88].
1727.—
"In the dread Ocean, undulating wide,
Beneath the radiant line that girts the globe,
The circling Typhon, whirl'd from point to point,
Exhausting all the rage of all the Sky...."
Thomson, Summer.
1780.—Appended to Dunn's New Directory, 5th ed. is:—
"Prognostic of a Tuffoon on the Coast of China. By Antonio Pascal de Rosa, a Portuguese Pilot of Macao."
c. 1810.—(Mr. Martyn) "was with us during a most tremendous touffan, and no one who has not been in a tropical region can, I think, imagine what these storms are."—Mrs. Sherwood's Autobiog. 382.
1826.—"A most terrific toofaun ... came on that seemed likely to tear the very trees up by the roots."—John Shipp, ii. 285.
" "I thanked him, and enquired how this toofan or storm had arisen."—Pandurang Hari, [ed. 1873, i. 50].
1836.—"A hurricane has blown ever since gunfire; clouds of dust are borne along upon the rushing wind; not a drop of rain; nothing is to be seen but the whirling clouds of the tūfān. The old peepul-tree moans, and the wind roars in it as if the storm would tear it up by the roots."—Wanderings of a Pilgrim, ii. 53.
1840.—"Slavers throwing overboard the Dead and Dying. Typhoon coming on.
"'Aloft all hands, strike the topmasts and belay;
Yon angry setting sun, and fierce-edge clouds
Declare the Typhoon's coming' &c. (Fallacies of Hope)."
J. M. W. Turner, in the R.A. Catalogue.
Punch parodied Turner in the following imaginary entry from the R.A. Catalogue:
1853.—"... pointing as he spoke to a dark dirty line which was becoming more and more visible in the horizon:
"'By Jove, yes!' cried Stanton, 'that's a typhaon coming up, sure enough.'"—Oakfield, i. 122.
1859.—"The weather was sultry and unsettled, and my Jemadar, Ramdeen Tewarry ... opined that we ought to make ready for the coming tuphan or tempest.... A darkness that might be felt, and that no lamp could illumine, shrouded our camp. The wind roared and yelled. It was a hurricane."—Lt.-Col. Lewin, A Fly on the Wheel, p. 62.
Compare the next quotation, from the same writer, with that given above from Couto respecting the Olho de Boi:
1885.—"The district was subject to cyclonic storms of incredible violence, fortunately lasting for a very short time, but which often caused much destruction. These storms were heralded by the appearance above the horizon of clouds known to the natives by the name of 'lady's eyebrows,' so called from their being curved in a narrow black-arched wisp, and these most surely foretold the approach of the tornado."—Ibid. 176.
TYRE, s. Tamil and Malayāl. tayir. The common term in S. India for curdled milk. It is the Skt. dadhi, Hind. dahi of Upper India, and probably the name is a corruption of that word.
1651.—"Tayer, dat is dicke Melch, die wie Saen nommen."—Rogerius, 138.
1672.—"Curdled milk, Tayer, or what we call Saane, is a thing very grateful to them, for it is very cooling, and used by them as a remedy, especially in hot fevers and smallpox, which is very prevalent in the country."—Baldaeus, Zeylon, 403.
1776.—"If a Bramin applies himself to commerce, he shall not sell ... Camphire and other aromaticks, or Honey, or Water, or Poison, or Flesh, or Milk, or Tyer (Sour Cream) or Ghee, or bitter Oil...."—Halhed, Code, 41.
1782.—"Les uns en furent affligés pour avoir passé les nuits et dormi en plein air; d'autres pour avoir mangé du riz froid avec du Tair."—Sonnerat, i. 201.
c. 1784.—"The Saniassi (Sunyasee), who lived near the chauderie (see CHOULTRY), took charge of preparing my meals, which consisted of rice, vegetables, tayar (lait caillé), and a little mologonier" (eau poivrée—see MULLIGATAWNY).—Haafner, i. 147.
[1800.—"The boiled milk, that the family has not used, is allowed to cool in the same vessel; and a little of the former day's tyre, or curdled milk, is added to promote its coagulation...."—Buchanan, Mysore, ii. 14.]
1822.—"He was indeed poor, but he was charitable; so he spread before them a repast, in which there was no lack of ghee, or milk, or tyer."—The Gooroo Paramartan, E.T. by Babington, p. 80.
- ↑ Hoggiae is of course Khwājas (see COJA). But in the B. Museum there is a copy of Leunclavius, ed. of 1588, with MS. autograph remarks by Joseph Scaliger; and on the word in question he notes as its origin (in Arabic characters): "Ḥujja(t) Disputatio"—which is manifestly erroneous.
- ↑ These are sheets of the Atlas of India, within Bhawalpur and Jeysalmīr, on the borders of Bikaner.
- ↑ Mr. Major, in his Introduction to Parke's Mendoza for the Hak. Soc. says of this embassy, that at their halt in the desert 12 marches from Su-chau, they were regaled "with a variety of strong liquors, together with a pot of Chinese tea." It is not stated by Mr. Major whence he took the account; but there is nothing about tea in the translation of M. Quatremère (Not. et Ext. xiv. pt. 1), nor in the Persian text given by him, nor in the translation by Mr. Rehatsek in the Ind. Ant. ii. 75 seqq.
- ↑ Queen Catharine.
- ↑ This book was printed in England, whilst the author was in India; doubtless he was innocent of this quaint error.
- ↑ This refers to an Arab legend that Samarkand was founded in very remote times by Tobba'-al-Akbar, Himyarite King of Yemen, (see e.g. Edrisi, by Jaubert, ii. 198), and the following: "The author of the Treatise on the Figure of the Earth says on this subject: "This is what was told me by Abu-Bakr-Dimashkī—'I have seen over the great gate of Samarkand an iron tablet bearing an inscription, which, according to the people of the place, was engraved in Himyarite characters, and as an old tradition related, had been the work of "Tobba."'"—Shihābuddīn Dimashkī, in Not. et Ext. xiii. 254.
- ↑ [Col. Temple notes that the pronunciation has always been twofold. At present in Burma it is usual to pronounce it like tickle, and in Siam like tacawl. He regards it as certain that it comes from takā through Talaing and Peguan t'ke.]
- ↑ Sir H. Rawlinson gives tigra as old Persian for an arrow (see Herod. vol. iii. p. 552). Vüllers seems to consider it rather an induction than a known word for an arrow. He says: "Besides the name of that river (Tigris) Arvand, which often occurs in the Shāhnāma, and which properly signifies 'running' or 'swift'; another Medo-persic name Tigra is found in the cuneiform inscriptions, and is cognate with the Zend word tedjao, tedjerem, and Pehlvi tedjera, i.e. 'a running river,' which is entered in Anquetil's vocabulary. And these, along with the Persian tej 'an arrow,' tegh 'a sword,' tekh and teg 'sharp,' are to be referred to the Zend root tikhsh, Skt. tij, 'to sharpen.' The Persian word tīr, 'an arrow,' may be of the same origin, since its primitive form appears to be tīgra, from which it seems to come by elision of the g, as the Skt. tīr, 'arrow,' comes from tīvra for tīgra, where v seems to have taken the place of g. From the word tīgra ... seem also to be derived the usual names of the river Tigris, Pers. Dizhla, Ar. Dijlah" (Vüllers, s.v. tīr).
- ↑ Some notice of Major Yule, whose valuable Oriental MSS. were presented to the British Museum after his death, will be found in Dr. Rieu's Preface to the Catalogue of Persian MSS. (vol. iii. p. xviii.).
- ↑ St. Julien et P. Champion, Industries Anciennes et Modernes de l'Empire Chinois, 1869, p. 75. Wells Williams says: "The peh-tung argentan, or white copper of the Chinese, is an alloy of copper 40.4, zinc 25.4, nickel 31.6, and iron 2.6, and occasionally a little silver; and these proportions are nearly those of German silver."—Middle Kingdom, ed. 1883, ii. 19.
- ↑ The Pers. partala is always used for a 'waist-belt' in India, but in Persia also for a turban.
- ↑ Busbecq (1554) says: "... ingens ubique florum copia offerebatur, Narcissorum, Hyacinthorum, et eorum quos Turcae Tulipan vocant."—Epist. i. Elzevir ed. p. 47.