c. 1554.—"24th Voyage: from Guvah-Sindābūr to Aden. If you start from Guvah-Sindābūr at the end of the season, take care not to fall on Cape Fāl," &c.—Mohit, in J.A.S.B. v. 564.
The last quotation shows that Goa was known even in the middle of the 16th century to Oriental seamen as Goa-Sindābūr, whatever Indian name the last part represented; probably, from the use of the ṣwād by the earlier Arab writers, and from the {838b}Chintabor of the European maps, Chandāpur rather than Sundāpur. No Indian name like this has yet been recovered from inscriptions as attaching to Goa; but the Turkish author of the Mohit supplies the connection, and Ibn Batuta's description even without this would be sufficient for the identification. His description, it will be seen, is that of a delta-island, and Goa is the only one partaking of that character upon the coast. He says it contained 36 villages; and Barros tells us that Goa Island was known to the natives as Tīsvāḍī, a name signifying "Thirty villages." (See SALSETTE.) Its vicinity to the island where Ibn Batuta proceeded to anchor, which we have shown to be Anchediva (q.v.), is another proof. Turning to Rashīduddīn, the order in which he places Sindābūr, Faknūr (Baccanore), Manjarūr (Mangalore), Hīlī (Mt. D'Ely), is perfectly correct, if for Sindābūr we substitute Goa. The passage from Edrisi and one indicated from Abulfeda only show a confusion which has misled many readers since.
SINGALESE, CINGHALESE, n.p. Native of Ceylon; pertaining to Ceylon. The word is formed from Siṉhala, 'Dwelling of Lions,' the word used by the natives for the Island, and which is the origin of most of the names given to it (see CEYLON). The explanation given by De Barros and Couto is altogether fanciful, though it leads them to notice the curious and obscure fact of the introduction of Chinese influence in Ceylon during the 15th century.
1552.—"That the Chinese (Chijs) were masters of the Choromandel Coast, of part of Malabar, and of this Island of Ceylon, we have not only the assertion of the Natives of the latter, but also evidence in the buildings, names, and language that they left in it ... and because they were in the vicinity of this Cape Galle, the other people who lived from the middle of the Island upwards called those dwelling about there Chingálla, and their language the same, as much as to say the language, or the people of the Chins of Galle."—Barros, III. ii. 1.
1583.—(The Cauchin Chineans) "are of the race of the Chingalays, which they say are the best kinde of all the Malabars."—Fitch, in Hakl. ii. 397.
1598.—"... inhabited with people called Cingalas...."—Linschoten, 24; [Hak. Soc. i. 77; in i. 81, Chingalas].
c. 1610.—"Ils tiennent donc que ... les premiers qui y allerent, et qui les peuplerent (les Maldives) furent ... les Cingalles de l'Isle de Ceylan."—Pyrard de Laval, i. 185; [Hak. Soc. i. 105, and see i. 266].
1612.—Couto, after giving the same explanation of the word as Barros, says: "And as they spring from the Chins, who are the falsest heathen of the East ... so are they {839a}of this island the weakest, falsest, and most tricky people in all India, insomuch that, to this day, you never find faith or truth in a Chingalla."—V. i. 5.
1681.—"The Chingūleys are naturally a people given to sloth and laziness: if they can but anyways live, they abhor to work."...—Knox, 32.
SINGAPORE, SINCAPORE, n.p. This name was adopted by Sir Stamford Raffles in favour of the city which he founded, February 23, 1819, on the island which had always retained the name since the Middle Ages. This it derived from Siṉhapura, Skt. 'Lion-city,' the name of a town founded by Malay or Javanese settlers from Sumatra, probably in the 14th century, and to which Barros ascribes great commercial importance. The Indian origin of the name, as of many other names and phrases which survive from the old Indian civilisation of the Archipelago, had been forgotten, and the origin which Barros was taught to ascribe to it is on a par with his etymology of Singalese quoted in the preceding article. The words on which his etymology is founded are no doubt Malay: singah, 'to tarry, halt, or lodge,' and pora-pora, 'to pretend'; and these were probably supposed to refer to the temporary occupation of Sinhapura, before the chiefs who founded it passed on to Malacca. [It may be noted that Dennys (Desc. Dict. s.v.) derives the word from singha, 'a place of call,' and pura, 'a city.' In Dalboquerque's Comm. Hak. Soc. iii. 73, we are told: "Singapura, whence the city takes its name, is a channel through which all the shipping of those parts passes, and signifies in his Malay language, 'treacherous delay.'" See quotation from Barros below.]
The settlement of Hinduized people on the site, if not the name, is probably as old as the 4th century, A.D., for inscriptions have been found there in a very old character. One of these, on a rock at the mouth of the little river on which the town stands, was destroyed some 40 or 50 years ago for the accommodation of some wretched bungalow.
The modern Singapore and its prosperity form a monument to the patriotism, sagacity, and fervid spirit of the founder. According to an article in the Geogr. Magazine (i. 107) derived from Mr. Archibald Ritchie, {839b}who was present with the expedition which founded the colony, Raffles, after consultation with Lord Hastings, was about to establish a settlement for the protection and encouragement of our Eastern trade, in the Nicobar Islands, when his attention was drawn to the superior advantages of Singapore by Captains Ross and Crawford of the Bombay Marine, who had been engaged in the survey of those seas. Its great adaptation for a mercantile settlement had been discerned by the shrewd, if somewhat vulgar, Scot, Alexander Hamilton, 120 years earlier. It seems hardly possible, we must however observe, to reconcile the details in the article cited, with the letters and facts contained in the Life of Raffles; though probably the latter had, at some time or other, received information from the officers named by Mr. Ritchie.
1512.—"And as the enterprise was one to make good booty, everybody was delighted to go on it, so that they were more than 1200 men, the soundest and best armed of the garrison, and so they were ready incontinently, and started for the Strait of Cincapura, where they were to wait for the junks."—Correa, ii. 284-5.
1551.—"Sed hactenus Deus nobis adsit omnibus. Amen. Anno post Christum natum, MDLI. Ex Freto Syncapurano."—Scti. Franc. Xaverii Epistt. Pragae, 1667, Lib. III. viii.
1553.—"Anciently the most celebrated settlement in this region of Malaca was one called Cingapura, a name which in their tongue means 'pretended halt' (falsa dimora); and this stood upon a point of that country which is the most southerly of all Asia, and lies, according to our graduation, in half a degree of North Latitude ... before the foundation of Malaca, at this same Cingapura ... flocked together all the navigators of the Seas of India from West and East...."—Barros, II. vi. 1. [The same derivation is given in the Comm. of Dalboquerque, Hak. Soc. iii. 73.]
1572.—
"Mas na ponta da terra Cingapura
Verás, onde o caminho as naos se estreita;
Daqui, tornando a costa á Cynosura,
Se incurva, e para a Aurora se endireita."
Camões, x. 125.
By Burton:
"But on her Lands-end throned see Cingapúr,
where the wide sea-road shrinks to narrow way:
Thence curves the coast to face the Cynosure,
and lastly trends Aurora-wards its lay."
1598.—"... by water the coast stretcheth to the Cape of Singapura, and from thence {840a}it runneth upwards [inwards] againe...."—Linschoten, 30; [Hak. Soc. i. 101].
1599.—"In this voyage nothing occurred worth relating, except that, after passing the Strait of Sincapura, situated in one degree and a half, between the main land and a variety of islands ... with so narrow a channel that from the ship you could jump ashore, or touch the branches of the trees on either side, our vessel struck on a shoal."—Viaggi di Carletti, ii. 208-9.
1606.—"The 5th May came there 2 Prows from the King of Johore, with the Shahbander (Shabunder) of Singapoera, called Siri Raja Nagara...."—Valentijn, v. 331.
1616.—"Found a Dutch man-of-war, one of a fleet appointed for the siege of Malaca, with the aid of the King of Acheen, at the entrance of the Straits of Singapore."—Sainsbury, i. 458.
1727.—"In anno 1703 I called at Johore on my Way to China, and he treated me very kindly, and made me a Present of the Island of Sincapure, but I told him it could be of no use to a private Person, tho' a proper Place for a Company to settle a Colony in, lying in the Center of Trade, and being accommodated with good Rivers and safe Harbours, so conveniently situated that all Winds served Shipping, both to go out and come in."—A. Hamilton, ii. 98; [ed. 1744, ii. 97].
1818.—"We are now on our way to the eastward, in the hope of doing something, but I much fear the Dutch have hardly left us an inch of ground.... My attention is principally turned to Johore, and you must not be surprised if my next letter to you is dated from the site of the ancient city of Singapura."—Raffles, Letter to Marsden, dated Sandheads, Dec. 12.
SINGARA, s. Hind. singhārā, Skt. sriṇgāttaka, sriṇga, 'a horn.' The caltrop or water-chestnut; Trapa bispinosa, Roxb. (N.O. Haloragaceae).
[c. 1590.—The Āīn (ed. Jarrett, ii. 65) mentions it as one of the crops on which revenue was levied in cash.
[1798.—In Kashmīr "many of them ... were obliged to live on the Kernel of the singerah, or water-nut...."—Forster, Travels, ii. 29.
[1809.—Buchanan-Hamilton writes singghara.—Eastern India, i. 241.]
1835.—"Here, as in most other parts of India, the tank is spoiled by the water-chestnut, singhara (Trapa bispinosa), which is everywhere as regularly planted and cultivated in fields under a large surface of water, as wheat or barley is in the dry plains.... The nut grows under the water after the flowers decay, and is of a triangular shape, and covered with a tough brown integument adhering strongly to the kernel, which is wholly esculent, and of a fine cartilaginous texture. The people are very fond of these nuts, and they are carried {840b}often upon bullocks' backs two or three hundred miles to market."—Sleeman, Rambles, &c. (1844), i. 101; [ed. Smith, i. 94.]
1839.—"The nuts of the Trapa bispinosa, called Singhara, are sold in all the Bazaars of India; and a species called by the same name, forms a considerable portion of the food of the inhabitants of Cashmere, as we learn from Mr. Forster [loc. cit.] that it yields the Government 12,000l. of revenue; and Mr. Moorcroft mentions nearly the same sum as Runjeet Sing's share, from 96,000 to 128,000 ass-loads of this nut, yielded by the Lake of Oaller."—Royle, Him. Plants, i. 211.
SIPAHSELAR, s. A General-in-chief; Pers. sipāh-sālār, 'army-leader,' the last word being the same as in the title of the late famous Minister-Regent of Hyderabad, Sir Sālār Jang, i.e. 'the leader in war.'
c. 1000-1100.—"Voici quelle étoit alors la gloire et la puissance des Orpélians dans le royaume. Ils possédoient la charge de sbasalar, ou de généralissime de toute la Georgie. Tous les officiers du palais étoient de leur dependance."—Hist. of the Orpélians, in St. Martin, Mem. sur l'Arménie, ii. 77.
c. 1358.—"At 16 my father took me by the hand, and brought me to his own Monastery. He there addressed me: 'My boy, our ancestors from generation to generation have been commanders of the armies of the Jagtay and the Berlas family. The dignity of (Sepah Salar) Commander-in-Chief has now descended to me, but as I am tired of this world ... I mean therefore to resign my public office...."—Autob. Mem. of Timour, E.T. p. 22.
1712.—"Omnibus illis superior est ... Sipah Salaar, sive Imperator Generalis Regni, Praesidem dignitate excipiens...."—Kaempfer, Amoen. Exot. 73.
1726.—A letter from the Heer Van Maatzuiker "to His Highness Chan Chanaan, Sapperselaar, Grand Duke, and General in Chief of the Great Mogol in Assam, Bengal, &c."—Valentijn, v. 173.
1755.—"After the Sipahsalar Hydur, by his prudence and courage, had defeated the Mahrattas, and recovered the country taken by them, he placed the government of Seringaputtun on a sure and established basis...."—Meer Hussein Ali Khan, H. of Hydur Naik, O. T. F. p. 61.
[c. 1803.—In a collection of native letters, the titles of Lord Lake are given as follows: "Ashja-ul-Mulk Khān Daurān, General Gerard Lake Bahādur, Sipahsalar-i-kishwar-i-Hind," "Valiant of the Kingdom, Lord of the Cycle, Commander-in-chief of the Territories of Hindustan."—North Indian Notes and Queries, iv. 17.]
SIRCAR, s. Hind. from Pers. sar-kār, 'head (of) affairs.' This word has very divers applications; but its senses may fall under three heads.
a. The State, the Government, the Supreme authority; also 'the Master' or head of the domestic government. Thus a servant, if asked 'Whose are those horses?' in replying 'They are the sarkār's,' may mean according to circumstances, that they are Government horses, or that they belong to his own master.
b. In Bengal the word is applied to a domestic servant who is a kind of house-steward, and keeps the accounts of household expenditure, and makes miscellaneous purchases for the family; also, in merchants' offices, to any native accountant or native employed in making purchases, &c.
c. Under the Mahommedan Governments, as in the time of the Mogul Empire, and more recently in the Deccan, the word was applied to certain extensive administrative divisions of territory. In its application in the Deccan it has been in English generally spelt Circar (q.v.).
a.—
[1759.—"... there is no separation between your Honour ... and this Sircar...."—Forrest, Bombay Letters, ii. 129.]
1800.—"Would it not be possible and proper to make people pay the circar according to the exchange fixed at Seringapatam?"—Wellington, i. 60.
[1866.—"... the Sirkar Buhadoor gives me four rupees a month...."—Confessions of an Orderly, 43.]
b.—
1777.—"There is not in any country in the world, of which I have any knowledge, a more pernicious race of vermin in human shape than are the numerous cast of people known in Bengal by the appellation of Sircars; they are educated and trained to deceive."—Price's Tracts, i. 24.
1810.—"The Sircar is a genius whose whole study is to handle money, whether receivable or payable, and who contrives either to confuse accounts, when they are adverse to his view, or to render them most expressively intelligible, when such should suit his purpose."—Williamson, V.M. i. 200.
1822.—"One morning our Sircar, in answer to my having observed that the articles purchased were highly priced, said, 'You are my father and my mother, and I am your poor little child. I have only taken 2 annas in the rupee dustoorie'" (dustoor).—Wanderings of a Pilgrim, i. 21-22.
1834.—"'And how the deuce,' asked his companion, 'do you manage to pay for them?' 'Nothing so easy,—I say to my Sirkar: 'Baboo, go pay for that horse 2000 {841b}rupees, and it is done, Sir, as quickly as you could dock him.'"—The Baboo and Other Tales, i. 13.
c.—
c. 1590.—"In the fortieth year of his majesty's reign, his dominions consisted of 105 Sircars, subdivided into 2737 kusbahs" (cusba), "the revenue of which he settled for ten years at 3 Arribs, 62 Crore, 97 Lacks, 55,246 Dams" (q.v. 3,62,97,55,246 dāms = about 9 millions sterling).—Ayeen, E.T. by Gladwin, 1800, ii. 1; [ed. Jarrett, ii. 115.]
SIRDAR, s. Hind. from Pers. sardār, and less correctly sirdār, 'leader, a commander, an officer'; a chief, or lord; the head of a set of palankin-bearers, and hence the 'sirdār-bearer,' or elliptically 'the Sirdār,' is in Bengal the style of the valet or body-servant, even when he may have no others under him (see BEARER). [Sirdār is now the official title of the Commander-in-Chief of the Egyptian army; Sirdār Bahādur is an Indian military distinction.]
[c. 1610.—"... a captain of a company, or, as they call it, a Sardare."—Pyrard de Laval, Hak. Soc. i. 254.
[1675.—"Sardar." See under SEPOY.]
1808.—"I, with great difficulty, knocked up some of the villagers, who were nearly as much afraid as Christie's Will, at the visit of a Sirdār" (here an officer).—Life of Leyden.
[c.
SIRDRÁRS, s. This is the name which native valets (bearer) give to common drawers (underclothing). A friend (Gen. R. Maclagan, R.E.) has suggested the origin, which is doubtless "short drawers" in contradistinction to Long-drawers, or Pyjamas (qq.v.). A common bearer's pronunciation is sirdrāj; as a chest of drawers is also called 'Drāj kā almairā' (see ALMYRA).
SIRKY, s. Hind. sirkī. A kind of unplatted matting formed by laying the fine cylindrical culms from the upper part of the Saccharum sara, Roxb. (see SURKUNDA) side by side, and binding them in single or double layers. This is used to lay under the thatch of a house, to cover carts and {842a}palankins, to make Chicks (q.v.) and table-mats, and for many other purposes of rural and domestic economy.
1810.—"It is perhaps singular that I should have seen seerky in use among a group of gypsies in Essex. In India these itinerants, whose habits and characters correspond with this intolerable species of banditti, invariably shelter themselves under seerky."—Williamson, V.M. ii. 490.
[1832.—"... neat little huts of sirrakee, a reed or grass, resembling bright straw."—Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali, Observations, i. 23.]
SIRRIS, s. Hind. siris, Skt. shirisha, shri, 'to break,' from the brittleness of its branches; the tree Acacia Lebbek, Benth., indigenous in S. India, the Sātpura range, Bengal, and the sub-Himālayan tract; cultivated in Egypt and elsewhere. A closely kindred sp., A. Julibrissin, Boivin, affords a specimen of scientific 'Hobson-Jobson'; the specific name is a corruption of Gulāb-reshm, 'silk-flower.'
1808.—"Quelques anneés après le mort de Dariyaî, des charpentiers ayant abattu un arbre de Seris, qui croissoit auprès de son tombeau, le coupèrent en plusieurs pièces pour l'employer à des constructions. Tout-à-coup une voix terrible se fit entendre, la terre se mit à trembler et le tronc de cet arbre se releva de lui-même. Les ouvriers épouvantés s'enfuirent, et l'arbre ne tarda pas à reverdir."—Afsōs, Arāyish-i-Mahfil, quoted by Garcin de Tassy, Rel. Mus. 88.
[c. 1890.—
"An' it fell when sirris-shaws were sere,
And the nichts were long and mirk."
R. Kipling, Departmental Ditties, The Fall of Jock Gillespie.]
SISSOO, SHISHAM, s. Hind. sīsū, sīsūn, shīsham, Skt. śinśapā; Ar. sāsam, sāsim; the tree Dalbergia Sissoo, Roxb. (N.O. Leguminosae) and its wood. This is excellent, and valuable for construction, joinery, boat- and carriage-building, and furniture. It was the favourite wood for gun-carriages as long as the supply of large timber lasted. It is now much cultivated in the Punjab plantations. The tree is indigenous in the sub-Himālayan tracts; and believed to be so likewise in Beluchistan, Guzerat, and Central India. Another sp. of Dalbergia (D. latifolia) affords the Black Wood (q.v.) of S. and W. India. There can be little doubt that one or more of these species of Dalbergia afforded the sesamine wood spoken of in the Periplus, and in some old Arabic writers. A quotation under Black {842b}Wood shows that this wood was exported from India to Chaldaea in remote ages. Sissoo has continued in recent times to be exported to Egypt, (see Forskal, quoted by Royle, Hindu Medicine, 128). Royle notices the resemblance of the Biblical shittim wood to shīsham.
c. A.D. 80.—"... Thither they are wont to despatch from Barygaza (Broach) to both these ports of Persia, great vessels with brass, and timbers, and beams of teak (ξύλων σαγαλίνων καὶ δοκῶν) ... and logs of shīsham (φαλάγγων σασαμίνων)...."—Periplus, Maris Erythr., cap. 36.
c. 545.—"These again are passed on from Sielediba to the marts on this side, such as Malé, where the pepper is grown, and Kalliana, whence are exported brass, and shīsham logs (σησαμίνα ξύλα), and other wares."—Cosmas, lib. xi.
? before 1200.—
"There are the wolf and the parrot, and the peacock, and the dove,
And the plant of Zinj, and al-sāsim, and pepper...."
Verses on India by Abu'l-ḍhal'i, the Sindi,
quoted by Kazvīnī, in Gildemeister, p. 218.
1810.—"Sissoo grows in most of the great forests, intermixed with saul.... This wood is extraordinarily hard and heavy, of a dark brown, inclining to a purple tint when polished."—Williamson, V.M. ii. 71.
1839.—"As I rode through the city one day I saw a considerable quantity of timber lying in an obscure street. On examining it I found it was shīsham, a wood of the most valuable kind, being not liable to the attacks of white ants."—Dry Leaves from Young Egypt, ed. 1851, p. 102.
SITTING-UP. A curious custom, in vogue at the Presidency towns more than a century ago, and the nature of which is indicated by the quotations. Was it of Dutch origin?
1777.—"Lady Impey sits up with Mrs. Hastings; vulgo toad-eating."—Ph. Francis's Diary, quoted in Busteed, Echoes of Old Calcutta, 124; [3rd ed. 125].
1780.—"When a young lady arrives at Madras, she must, in a few days afterwards sit up to receive company, attended by some beau or master of the ceremonies, which perhaps continues for a week, or until she has seen all the fair sex, and gentlemen of the settlement."—Munro's Narr., 56.
1795.—"You see how many good reasons there are against your scheme of my taking horse instantly, and hastening to throw myself at the lady's feet; as to the other, of proxy, I can only agree to it under certain conditions.... I am not to be forced to sit up, and receive male or female {843a}visitors.... I am not to be obliged to deliver my opinion on patterns for caps or petticoats for any lady...."—T. Munro to his Sister, in Life, i. 169.
1810.—"Among the several justly exploded ceremonies we may reckon that ... of 'Sitting up.'... This 'Sitting up,' as it was termed, generally took place at the house of some lady of rank or fortune, who, for three successive nights, threw open her mansion for the purpose of receiving all ... who chose to pay their respects to such ladies as might have recently arrived in the country."—Williamson, V.M. i. 113.
SITTRINGY, s. Hind. from Ar. shiṭranjī, shaṭranjī, and that from Pers. shaṭrang, 'chess,' which is again of Skt. origin, chaturanga, 'quadripartite' (see SADRAS). A carpet of coloured cotton, now usually made in stripes, but no doubt originally, as the name implies, in chequers.
1648.—"... Een andere soorte van slechte Tapijten die mẽ noemt Chitrenga."—Van Twist, 63.
1673.—"They pull off their Slippers, and after the usual Salams, seat themselves in Choultries, open to some Tank of purling Water; commonly spread with Carpets or Siturngees."—Fryer, 93.
[1688.—"2 citterengees."—In Yule, Hedges' Diary, Hak. Soc. ii. cclxv.]
1785.—"To be sold by public auction ... the valuable effects of Warren Hastings, Esquire ... carpets and sittringees."—In Seton-Karr, i. 111.
SIWALIK, n.p. This is the name now applied distinctively to that outer range of tertiary hills which in various parts of the Himālaya runs parallel to the foot of the mountain region, separated from it by valleys known in Upper India as dūns (see DHOON). But this special and convenient sense (d) has been attributed to the term by modern Anglo-Indian geographers only. Among the older Mahommedan historians the term Siwālikh is applied to a territory to the west of and perhaps embracing the Aravalli Hills, but certainly including specifically Nagore (Nāgaur) and Mandāwar the predecessor of modern Jodhpūr, and in the vicinity of that city. This application is denoted by (a).
In one or two passages we find the application of the name (Siwālikh) extending a good deal further south, as if reaching to the vicinity of Mālwā. Such instances we have grouped under (b). But it is possible that the early {843b}application (a) habitually extended thus far.
At a later date the name is applied to the Himālaya; either to the range in its whole extent, as in the passages from Chereffedin (Sharīffuddīn 'Ali of Yezd) and from Baber; sometimes with a possible limitation to that part of the mountains which overlooks the Punjab; or, as the quotation from Rennell indicates, with a distinction between the less lofty region nearest the plains, and the Alpine summits beyond, Siwālik applying to the former only.
The true Indian form of the name is, we doubt not, to be gathered from the occurrence, in a list of Indian national names, in the Vishnu Purāna, of the Saivālas. But of the position of these we can only say that the nations, with whom the context immediately associates them, seem to lie towards the western part of Upper India. (See Wilson's Works, Vishnu Purāna, ii. 175.) The popular derivation of Siwālik as given in several of the quotations below, is from sawalākh, 'One lākh and a quarter'; but this is of no more value than most popular etymologies.
We give numerous quotations to establish the old application of the term, because this has been somewhat confused in Elliot's extracts by the interpolated phrase 'Siwálik Hills,' where it is evident from Raverty's version of the Ṭabaḳāt-i-Nāṣirī that there is no such word as Hills in the original.
We have said that the special application of the term to the detached sub-Himālayan range is quite modern. It seems in fact due to that very eminent investigator in many branches of natural science, Dr. Hugh Falconer; at least we can find no trace of it before the use of the term by him in papers presented to the Asiatic Society of Bengal. It is not previously used, so far as we can discover, even by Royle; nor is it known to Jacquemont, who was intimately associated with Royle and Cautley, at Sahāranpūr, very shortly before Falconer's arrival there. Jacquemont (Journal, ii. 11) calls the range: "la première chaine de montagnes que j'appellerai les montagnes de Dehra." The first occurrence that we can find is in a paper by Falconer on the 'Aptitude of {844a}the Himālayan Range for the Culture of the Tea Plant,' in vol. iii. of the J. As. Soc. Bengal, which we quote below. A year later, in the account of the Sivatherium fossil, by Falconer and Cautley, in the As. Researches, we have a fuller explanation of the use of the term Siwālik, and its alleged etymology.
It is probable that there may have been some real legendary connection of the hills in the vicinity with the name of Śiva. For in some of the old maps, such as that in Bernier's Travels, we find Siba given as the name of a province about Hurdwār; and the same name occurs in the same connection in the Mem. of the Emperor Jahāngīr (Elliot, vi. 382). [On the connection of Siva worship with the lower Himālaya, see Atkinson, Himalayan Gazetteer, ii. 743.]
a.—
1118.—"Again he rebelled, and founded the fortress of Nāghawr, in the territory of Siwālikh, in the neighbourhood of Bīrah(?)."—Ṭabaḳāt-i-Nāṣirī, E.T. by Raverty, 110.
1192.—"The seat of government, Ajmīr, with the whole of the Siwālikh [territory], such as (?) Hānsi, Sursutī, and other tracts, were subjugated."—Ibid. 468-469.
1227.—"A year subsequent to this, in 624 H., he (Sultan Iyaltimish) marched against the fort of Manḍawar within the limits of the Siwālikh [territory], and its capture, likewise the Almighty God facilitated for him."—Ibid. 611.
c. 1247.—"... When the Sultan of Islam, Nāṣir-ud Dunyā-wa-ud-Dīn, ascended the throne of sovereignty ... after Malik Balban had come [to Court?] he, on several occasions made a request for Uchchah together with Multan. This was acquiesced in, under the understanding that the Siwālikh [territory] and Nāg-awr should be relinquished by him to other Maliks...."—Ibid. 781.
1253.—"When the new year came round, on Tuesday, the 1st of the month of Muḥarram, 651 H., command was given to Ulugh Khān-i-A'z̤am ... to proceed to his fiefs, the territory of Siwālikh and Hānsī."—Ibid. 693.
1257.—"Malik Balban ... withdrew (from Dehli), and by way of the Siwālikh [country], and with a slight retinue, less than 200 or 300 in number, returned to Uchchah again."—Ibid. 786.
1255.—"When the royal tent was pitched at Talh-pat, the [contingent] forces of the Siwālikh [districts], which were the fiefs of Ulugh Khān-i-A'z̤am, had been delayed ... (he) set out for Hānsī ... (and there) issued his mandate, so that, in the space of 14 days, the troops of the Siwālikh, {844b}Hānsī, Sursutī, Jīnd [Jhīnd], and Barwālah ... assembled...."—Ibid. 837.
1260.—"Ulugh Khān-i-A'z̤am resolved upon making a raid upon the Koh-pāyah [hill tracts of Mewāt] round about the capital, because in this ... there was a community of obdurate rebels, who, unceasingly, committed highway robbery, and plundered the property of Musalmāns ... and destruction of the villages in the districts of Harīānah, the Siwālikh, and Bhīānah, necessarily followed their outbreaks."—Ibid. 850.
1300-10.—"The Mughals having wasted the Siwálik, had moved some distance off. When they and their horses returned weary and thirsty to the river, the army of Islám, which had been waiting for them some days, caught them as they expected...."—Ziā-uddīn Barnī, in Elliot, iii. 199.
b.—
c. 1300.—"Of the cities on the shore the first is Sandabúr, then Faknúr, then the country of Manjarúr, then the country of (Fandarainá), then Jangli (Jinkali), then Kúlam.... After these comes the country of Sawálak, which comprises 125,000 cities and villages. After that comes Málwála" (but in some MSS. Málwá).—Rashīduddīn, in Elliot, i. 68. Rashīduddīn has got apparently much astray here, for he brings in the Siwālik territory at the far end of Malabar. But the mention of Mālwā as adjoining is a probable indication of the true position. (Elliot imagines here some allusion to the Maldives and Laccadives. All in that way that seems possible is that Rashīduddīn may have heard of the Maldives and made some jumble between them and Mālwā). And this is in a manner confirmed by the next quotation from a Portuguese writer who places the region inland from Guzerat.
1644.—"It confines ... on the east with certain kingdoms of heathen, which are called Saualacca prabatta (Skt. parvata), as much as to say 120,000 mountains."—Bocarro, MS.
c.—
1399.—"Le Détroit de Coupelé est situé au pied d'une montagne par où passe le Gange, et à quinze milles plus haut que ce Détroit il y a une pierre en forme de Vache, de laquelle sort la source de ce grand Fleuve; c'est la cause pour laquelle les Indous adorent cette pierre, et dans tous les pays circonvoisins jusques à une année de chemin, ils se tournent pour prier du côté de ce Détroit et de cette Vache de pierre.... Cependant on eut avis que dans la montagne de Soüalec, qui est une des plus considerables de l'Inde, et qui s'étend dans le deux tiers de ce grand Empire, il s'étoit assemblé un grand nombre d'Indiens qui cherchoient à nous faire insulte."—H. de Timur-Bec, par Chereffedin Ali d'Yezd (Fr. Tr. by Petis de la Croix), Delf, 1723, iii. ch. xxv.-xxvi.
1528.—"The northern range of hills has been mentioned ... after leaving Kashmîr, these hills contain innumerable tribes and states, pergannahs and countries, and extend all the way to Bengal and the shores of the Great Ocean.... The chief trade of the inhabitants of these hills is in musk-bags, the tails of the mountain cow, saffron, lead, and copper. The natives of Hind call these hills Sewâlik-Parbat. In the language of Hind Sawalâk means a lak and a quarter (or 125,000), and Parbat means a hill, that is, the 125,000 hills. On these hills the snow never melts, and from some parts of Hindustán, such as Lahore, Sehrend, and Sambal, it is seen white on them all the year round."—Baber, p. 313.
c. 1545.—"Sher Sháh's dying regrets.
"On being remonstrated with for giving way to low spirits, when he had done so much for the good of the people during his short reign, after earnest solicitation, he said, 'I have had three or four desires on my heart, which still remain without accomplishment.... One is, I wished to have depopulated the country of Roh, and to have transferred its inhabitants to the tract between the Niláb and Lahore, including the hills below Nindūna as far as the Siwálik.'"—Táríkh-Khán Jahán Lodí, in Elliot, v. 107-8. Nindūna was on Balnāth, a hill over the Jelam (compare Elliot, ii. 450-1).
c. 1547-8.—"After their defeat the Níázís took refuge with the Ghakkars, in the hill-country bordering on Kashmír. Islám Sháh ... during the space of two years was engaged in constant conflicts with the Ghakkars, whom he desired to subdue.... Skirting the hills he went thence to Múrín (?), and all the Rájás of the Siwálik presented themselves.... Parsurám, the Rájá of Gwálior, became a staunch servant of the King ... Gwálior is a hill, which is on the right hand towards the South, amongst the hills, as you go to Kángra and Nagarkot." (See NUGGURCOTE).—Táríkh-i-Dáúdí, in Elliot, iv. 493-4.
c. 1555.—"The Imperial forces encountered the Afghans near the Siwálik mountains, and gained a victory which elicited gracious marks of approval from the Emperor. Sikandar took refuge in the mountains and jungles.... Rájá Rám Chand, Rájá of Nagarkot, was the most renowned of all the Rájás of the hills, and he came and made his submission."—Ṭabaḳát-i-Akbarí, in Elliot, v. 248.
c. 1560.—"The Emperor (Akbar) then marched onwards towards the Siwálik hills, in pursuit of the Khán-Khánán. He reached the neighbourhood of Talwára, a district in the Siwálik, belonging to Rájá Gobind Chand.... A party of adventurous soldiers dashed forward into the hills, and surrounding the place put many of the defenders to the sword."—Ibid. 267.
c. 1570.—"Husain Khán ... set forth from Lucknow with the design of breaking down the idols, and demolishing the idol temples. For false reports of their {845b}unbounded treasures had come to his ears. He proceeded through Oudh, towards the Siwálik hills.... He then ravaged the whole country, as far as the Kasbah of Wajráíl, in the country of Rájá Ranka, a powerful zamíndár, and from that town to Ajmír which is his capital."—Badáúni, in Elliot, iv. 497.
1594-5.—"The force marched to the Siwálik hills, and the Bakhshí resolved to begin by attacking Jammú, one of the strongest forts of that country."—Akbar Náma, in Elliot, v. 125.
c. " "Rám Deo ... returned to Kanauj ... after that he marched into the Siwálik hills, and made all the zamíndárs tributary. The Rájá of Kamáún ... came out against Rám Deo and gave him battle."—Firishta's Introduction, in Elliot, vi. 561.
1793.—"Mr. Daniel, with a party, also visited Sirinagur the same year [1789]: ... It is situated in an exceedingly deep and very narrow valley; formed by Mount Sewalick,[246] the northern boundary of Hindoostan, on the one side; and the vast range of snowy mountains of Himmaleh or Imaus, on the other; and from the report of the natives, it would appear, that the nearest part of the base of the latter (on which snow was actually falling in the month of May), was not more than 14 or 15 G. miles in direct distance to the N. or N.E. of Sirinagur town.
"In crossing the mountains of Sewalick, they met with vegetable productions, proper to the temperate climates."—Rennell's Mem., ed. 1793, pp. [368-369].
d.—
1834.—"On the flank of the great range there is a line of low hills, the Sewalik, which commence at Roopur, on the Satlej, and run down a long way to the south, skirting the great chain. In some places they run up to, and rise upon, the Himálayas; in others, as in this neighbourhood (Seháranpur), they are separated by an intermediate valley. Between the Jumna and Ganges they attain their greatest height, which Capt. Herbert estimates at 2,000 feet above the plains at their foot, or 3,000 above the sea. Seháranpur is about 1,000 feet above the sea. About 25 miles north are the Sewálik hills."—Falconer, in J.A.S.B. iii. 182.
1835.—"We have named the fossil Sivatherium from Siva the Hindu god, and θηρίον, bellua. The Siválik, or Sub-Himalayan range of hills, is considered, in the Hindu mythology, as the Lútiah or edge of the roof of Siva's dwelling on the Himálaya, and hence they are called the Siva-ala or Sib-ala, which by an easy transition of sound became the Sewálik of the English.
"The fossil has been discovered in a tract which may be included in the Sewálik {846a}range, and we have given the name of Sivatherium to it, to commemorate the remarkable formation, so rich in new animals. Another derivation of the name of the hills, as explained by the Mahant, or High Priest at Dehra, is as follows:—
"Sewálik, a corruption of Siva-wála, a name given to the tract of mountains between the Jumna and Ganges, from having been the residence of Iswara Siva and his son Ganes."—Falconer and Cautley, in As. Res., xix. p. 2.
1879.—"These fringing ranges of the later formations are known generally as the Sub-Himalayas. The most important being the Siwálik hills, a term especially applied to the hills south of the Deyra Dún, but frequently employed in a wider sense."—Medlicott and Blanford, Man. of the Geology of India, Intro. p. x.
[1899.—Even so late as this year the old inaccurate etymology of the word appears: "The term Shewalic is stated by one of the native historians to be a combination of two Hindee words 'sewa' and 'lae' (sic), the word 'sewa' signifying one and a quarter, and the word 'lae' being the term which expresses the number of one hundred thousand."—Thornhill, Haunts and Hobbies, 213.]
SKEEN, s. Tib. skyin. The Himalayan Ibex; (Capra Sibirica, Meyer). [See Blanford, Mammalia, 503.]
SLAVE. We cannot now attempt a history of the former tenure of slaves in British India, which would be a considerable work in itself. We only gather a few quotations illustrating that history.
1676.—"Of three Theeves, two were executed and one made a Slave. We do not approve of putting any to death for theft, nor that any of our own nation should be made a Slave, a word that becomes not an Englishman's mouth."—The Court to Ft. St. Geo., March 7. In Notes and Exts. No. i. p. 18.
1682.—"... making also proclamation by beat of drum that if any Slave would run away from us he should be free, and liberty to go where they pleased."—Hedges, Diary, Oct. 14; [Hak. Soc. i. 38].
[ " "There being a great number of Slaves yearly exported from this place, to ye great grievance of many persons whose Children are very commonly stollen away from them, by those who are constant traders in this way, the Agent, &c., considering the Scandall that might accrue to ye Government, &c., the great losse that many parents may undergoe by such actions, have order'd that noe more Slaves be sent off the shoare again."—Pringle, Diary, Ft. St. Geo., 1st ser. i. 70.]
1752.—"Sale of Slaves ... Rs. 10 : 1 : 3."—Among Items of Revenue. In Long, 34.
1637.—"We have taken into consideration the most effectual and speedy method for supplying our settlements upon the West Coast with slaves, and we have therefore fixed upon two ships for that purpose ... to proceed from hence to Madagascar to purchase as many as can be procured, and the said ships conveniently carry, who are to be delivered by the captains of those ships to our agents at Fort Marlborough at the rate of £15 a head."—Court's Letter of Dec. 8. In Long, 293.
1764.—"That as an inducement to the Commanders and Chief Mates to exert themselves in procuring as large a number of Slaves as the Ships can conveniently carry, and to encourage the Surgeons to take proper care of them in the passage, there is to be allowed 20 shillings for every slave shipped at Madagascar, to be divided, viz., 13s. 4d. a head to the Commander, and 6s. 8d. to the Chief Mate, also for every one delivered at Fort Marlborough the Commander is to be allowed the further sum of 6s. 8d. and the Chief Mate 3s. 4d. The Surgeon is likewise to be allowed 10s. for each slave landed at Fort Marlborough."—Court's Letter, Feb. 22. In Long, 366.
1778.—Mr. Busteed has given some curious extracts from the charge-sheet of the Calcutta Magistrate in this year, showing slaves and slave-girls, of Europeans, Portuguese, and Armenians, sent to the magistrate to be punished with the rattan for running away and such offences.—Echoes of Old Calcutta, 117 seqq. [Also see extracts from newspapers, &c., in Carey, Good Old Days, ii. 71 seqq.].
1782.—"On Monday the 29th inst. will be sold by auction ... a bay Buggy Horse, a Buggy and Harness ... some cut Diamonds, a quantity of China Sugarcandy ... a quantity of the best Danish Claret ... deliverable at Serampore; two Slave Girls about 6 years old; and a great variety of other articles."—India Gazette, July 27.
1785.—"Malver. Hair-dresser from Europe, proposes himself to the ladies of the settlement to dress hair daily, at two gold mohurs per month, in the latest fashion, with gauze flowers, &c. He will also instruct the slaves at a moderate price."—In Seton-Karr, i. 119. This was surely a piece of slang. Though we hear occasionally, in the advertisements of the time, of slave boys and girls, the domestic servants were not usually of that description.
1794.—"50 Rupees Reward for Discovery.
"Run off about four Weeks ago from a Gentleman in Bombay, A Malay Slave called Cambing or Rambing. He stole a Silk Purse, with 45 Venetians, and some Silver Buttons...."—Bombay Courier, Feb. 22.
SLING, SELING, n.p. This is the name used in the Himalayan regions for a certain mart in the direction of {847a}China which supplies various articles of trade. Its occurrence in Trade Returns at one time caused some discussion as to its identity, but there can be no doubt that it is Si-ning (Fu) in Kan-su. The name Sling is also applied, in Ladak and the Punjab, to a stuff of goat's wool made at the place so called.
c. 1730.—"Kokonor is also called Tzongombo, which means blue lake.... The Tibetans pretend that this lake belongs to them, and that the limits of Tibet adjoin those of the town of Shilin or Shilingh."—P. Orazio della Penna, E.T. in Markham's Tibet, 2d ed. 314.
1774.—"The natives of Kashmir, who like the Jews of Europe, or the Armenians in the Turkish Empire, scatter themselves over the Eastern kingdoms of Asia ... have formed extensive establishments at Lhasa and all the principal towns in the country. Their agents, stationed on the coast of Coromandel, in Bengal, Benares, Nepal, and Kashmir, furnish them with the commodities of these different countries, which they dispose of in Tibet, or forward to their associates at Seling, a town on the borders of China."—Bogle's Narrative, in Markham's Tibet, 124.
1793.—"... it is certain that the product of their looms (i.e. of Tibet and Nepaul) is as inconsiderable in quantity as it is insignificant in quality. The Joos (read TOOS) or flannel procured from the former, were it really a fabric of Tibet, would perhaps be admitted as an exception to the latter part of this observation; but the fact is that it is made at Siling, a place situated on the western borders of China."—Kirkpatrick's Acc. of Nepaul (1811), p. 134.
1854.—"List of Chinese Articles brought to India.... Siling, a soft and silky woollen of two kinds—1. Shirún. 2. Gorún."—Cunningham's Ladak, 241-2.
1862.—"Sling is a 'Pushmina' (fine wool) cloth, manufactured of goat-wool, taken from Karashaihr and Urumchi, and other districts of Turkish China, in a Chinese town called Sling."—Punjab Trade Report, App. p. ccxxix.
1871.—"There were two Calmucks at Yârkand, who had belonged to the suite of the Chinese Ambân.... Their own home they say is Zilm" (qu. Zilin?) "a country and town distant 1½ month's journey from either Aksoo or Khoten, and at an equal distance in point of time from Lhassa.... Zilm possesses manufactures of carpets, horse-trappings, pen-holders, &c.... This account is confirmed by the fact that articles such as those described are imported occasionally into Ladák, under the name of Zilm or Zirm goods.
"Now if the town of Zilm is six weeks journey from either Lhassa or Aksoo, its position may be guessed at."—Shaw, Visits to High Tartary, 38.
SLOTH, s. In the usual way of transferring names which belong to other regions, this name is sometimes applied in S. India to the Lemur (Loris gracilis, Jerdon).
SNAKE-STONE, s. This is a term applied to a substance, the application of which to the part where a snake-bite has taken effect, is supposed to draw out the poison and render it innocuous. Such applications are made in various parts of the Old and New Worlds. The substances which have this reputation are usually of a porous kind, and when they have been chemically examined have proved to be made of charred bone, or the like. There is an article in the 13th vol. of the Asiatic Researches by Dr. J. Davy, entitled An Analysis of the Snake-Stone, in which the results of the examination of three different kinds, all obtained from Sir Alex. Johnstone, Chief Justice of Ceylon, is given. (1) The first kind was of round or oval form, black or brown in the middle, white towards the circumference, polished and somewhat lustrous, and pretty enough to be sometimes worn as a neck ornament; easily cut with a knife, but not scratched by the nail. When breathed on it emitted an earthy smell, and when applied to the tongue, or other moist surface, it adhered firmly. This kind proved to be of bone partially calcined. (2) We give below a quotation regarding the second kind. (3) The third was apparently a bezoar, (q.v.), rather than a snake-stone. There is another article in the As. Res. xvi. 382 seqq. by Captain J. D. Herbert, on Zehr Mohereh, or Snake-Stone. Two kinds are described which were sold under the name given (Zahr muhra, where zahr is 'poison,' muhra, 'a kind of polished shell,' 'a bead,' applied to a species of bezoar). Both of these were mineral, and not of the class we are treating of.
c. 1666.—"C'est dans cette Ville de Diu que se font les Pierres de Cobra si renommées: elles sont composées de racines qu'on brûle, et dont on amasse les cendres pour les mettre avec une sorte de terre qu'ils ont, et les brûler encore une fois avec cette terre; et après cela on en fait la pâte dont ces Pierres sont formées.... Il faut faire sortir avec une éguille, un peu de sang de la plaie, y appliquer la Pierre, et l'y laisser jusqu'à ce qu'elle tombe d'elle même."—Thevenot, v. 97.
1673.—"Here are also those Elephant Legged St. Thomeans, which the unbiassed Enquirers will tell you chances to them two ways: By the Venom of a certain Snake, by which the Jaugies (see JOGEE) or Pilgrims furnish them with a Factitious Stone (which we call a snake-stone), and is a Counter-poyson of all deadly Bites; if it stick, it attracts the Poyson; and put into Milk it recovers itself again, leaving its virulency therein, discovered by its Greenness."—Fryer, 53.
c. 1676.—"There is the Serpent's stone not to be forgot, about the bigness of a double (doubloon?); and some are almost oval, thick in the middle and thin about the sides. The Indians report that it is bred in the head of certain Serpents. But I rather take it to be a story of the Idoloter's Priests, and that the Stone is rather a composition of certain Drugs.... If the Person bit be not much wounded, the place must be incis'd; and the Stone being appli'd thereto, will not fall off till it has drawn all the poison to it: To cleanse it you must steep it in Womans-milk, or for want of that, in Cows-milk.... There are two ways to try whether the Serpent-stone be true or false. The first is, by putting the Stone in your mouth, for there it will give a leap, and fix to the Palate. The other is by putting it in a glass full of water; for if the Stone be true, the water will fall a boyling, and rise in little bubbles...."—Tavernier, E.T., Pt. ii. 155; [ed. Ball, ii. 152]. Tavernier also speaks of another snake-stone alleged to be found behind the hood of the Cobra: "This Stone being rubb'd against another Stone, yields a slime, which being drank in water," &c. &c.—Ibid.
1690.—"The thing which he carried ... is a Specific against the Poison of Snakes ... and therefore obtained the name of Snake-stone. It is a small artificial Stone.... The Composition of it is Ashes of burnt Roots, mixt with a kind of Earth, which is found at Diu...."—Ovington, 260-261.
1712.—"Pedra de Cobra: ita dictus lapis, vocabulo a Lusitanis imposito, adversus viperarum morsus praestat auxilium, externè applicatus. In serpente, quod vulgò credunt, non invenitur, sed arte secretâ fabricatur à Brahmanis. Pro dextro et felici usu, oportet adesse geminos, ut cum primus veneno saturatus vulnusculo decidit, alter surrogari illico in locum possit.... Quo ipso feror, ut istis lapidibus nihil efficaciæ inesse credam, nisi quam actuali frigiditate suâ, vel absorbendo praestant."—Kaempfer, Amoen. Exot. 395-7.
1772.—"Being returned to Roode-Zand, the much celebrated Snake-stone (Slange-steen) was shown to me, which few of the farmers here could afford to purchase, it being sold at a high price, and held in great esteem. It is imported from the Indies, especially from Malabar, and cost several, frequently 10 or 12, rix dollars. It is round, and convex on one side, of a black colour, with a pale ash-grey speck in the {848b}middle, and tubulated with very minute pores.... When it is applied to any part that has been bitten by a serpent, it sticks fast to the wound, and extracts the poison; as soon as it is saturated, it falls off of itself...."—Thunberg, Travels, E.T. i. 155 (A Journey into Caffraria).
1796.—"Of the remedies to which cures of venomous bites are often ascribed in India, some are certainly not less frivolous than those employed in Europe for the bite of the viper; yet to infer from thence that the effects of the poison cannot be very dangerous, would not be more rational than to ascribe the recovery of a person bitten by a Cobra de Capello, to the application of a snake-stone, or to the words muttered over the patient by a Bramin."—Patrick Russell, Account of Indian Serpents, 77.
1820.—"Another kind of snake-stone ... was a small oval body, smooth and shining, externally black, internally grey; it had no earthy smell when breathed on, and had no absorbent or adhesive power. By the person who presented it to Sir Alexander Johnstone it was much valued, and for adequate reason if true, 'it had saved the lives of four men.'"—Dr. Davy, in As. Res. xiii. 318.
1860.—"The use of the Pamboo-Kaloo, or snake-stone, as a remedy in cases of wounds by venomous serpents, has probably been communicated to the Singhalese by the itinerant snake-charmers who resort to the island from the Coast of Coromandel; and more than one well-authenticated instance of its successful application has been told to me by persons who had been eye-witnesses."... (These follow.) "... As to the snake-stone itself, I submitted one, the application of which I have been describing, to Mr. Faraday, and he has communicated to me, as the result of his analysis, his belief that it is 'a piece of charred bone which has been filled with blood, perhaps several times, and then charred again.'... The probability is, that the animal charcoal, when instantaneously applied, may be sufficiently porous and absorbent to extract the venom from the recent wound, together with a portion of the blood, before it has had time to be carried into the system...."—Tennent, Ceylon, i. 197-200.
1861.—"'Have you been bitten?' 'Yes, Sahib,' he replied, calmly; 'the last snake was a vicious one, and it has bitten me.  This he wetted, and applied to the wound, to which it seemed to adhere ... he apparently suffered no ... material hurt. I was thus effectually convinced that snake-charming is a real art, and not merely clever conjuring, as I had previously imagined.  I have only to say that I believe they are perfectly powerless to produce any such effect ... when we reflect on the quantity of poison, and the force and depth with and to which it is injected ... and the extreme rapidity with which it is hurried along in the vascular system to the nerve centres, I think it is obvious that the application of one of these stones can be of little use in a real bite of a deadly snake, and that a belief in their efficacy is a dangerous delusion."—Fayrer, Thanatophidia of India, pp. 38, 40.
[1880.—"It is stated that in the pouch-like throat appendages of the older birds (adjutants), the fang of a snake is sometimes to be found. This, if rubbed above the place where a poisonous snake has bitten a man, is supposed to prevent the venom spreading to the vital parts of the body. Again, it is believed that a so-called 'snake-stone' is contained within the head of the adjutant. This, if applied to a snake-bite, attaches itself to the punctures, and extracts all the venom...."—Ball, Jungle Life, 82.]
SNEAKER, s. A large cup (or small basin) with a saucer and cover. The native servants call it sīnīgar. We had guessed that it was perhaps formed in some way from ṣīnī in the sense of 'china-ware,' or from the same word, used in Ar. and Pers., in the sense of 'a salver' (see CHINA, s.). But we have since seen that the word is not only in Grose's Lexicon Balatronicum, with the explanation 'a small bowl,' but is also in Todd: 'A small vessel of drink.' A sneaker of punch is a term still used in several places for a small bowl; and in fact it occurs in the Spectator and other works of the 18th century. So the word is of genuine English origin; no doubt of a semi-slang kind.
1714.—"Our little burlesque authors, who are the delight of ordinary readers, generally abound in these pert phrases, which have in them more vivacity than wit. I lately saw an instance of this kind of writing, which gave me so truly an idea of it, that I could not forbear begging a copy of the letter....
"Past 2 o'clock and
a frosty morning.
"Dear Jack,
"I have just left the Right Worshipful and his myrmidons about a sneaker of 5 gallons. The whole magistracy was pretty well disguised before I gave them the slip."
The Spectator, No. 616.
1715.—
"Hugh Peters is making
A sneaker within
For Luther, Buchanan,
John Knox, and Calvin;
And when they have toss'd off
A brace of full bowls,
{849b}You'll swear you ne'er met
With honester souls."
Bp. Burnett's Descent into Hell.
In Political Ballads of the 17th and 18th centuries.
Annotated by W. W. Wilkins, 1860, ii. 172.
1743.—"Wild ... then retired to his seat of contemplation, a night-cellar, where, without a single farthing in his pocket, he called for a sneaker of punch, and placing himself on a bench by himself, he softly vented the following soliloquy."—Fielding, Jonathan Wild, Bk. ii. ch. iv.
1772.—"He received us with great cordiality, and entreated us all, five in number, to be seated in a bungalow, where there were only two broken chairs. This compliment we could not accept of; he then ordered five sneakers of a mixture which he denominated punch."—Letter in Forbes, Or. Mem. iv. 217.
[SNOW RUPEE, s. A term in use in S. India, which is an excellent example of a corruption of the 'Hobson-Jobson' type. It is an Anglo-Indian corruption of the Tel. tsanauvu, 'authority, currency.']
SOFALA, n.p. Ar. Sufāla, a district and town of the East African coast, the most remote settlement towards the south made upon that coast by the Arabs. The town is in S. Lat. 20° 10′, more that 2° south of the Zambesi delta. The territory was famous in old days for the gold produced in the interior, and also for iron. It was not visited by V. da Gama either in going or returning.
c. 1150.—"This section embraces the description of the remainder of the country of Sofāla.... The inhabitants are poor, miserable, and without resources to support them except iron; of this metal there are numerous mines in the mountains of Sofāla. The people of the islands ... come hither for iron, which they carry to the continent and islands of India ... for although there is iron in the islands and in the mines of that country, it does not equal the iron of Sofāla."—Edrisi, i. 65.
c. 1220.—"Sofāla is the most remote known city in the country of the Zenj ... wares are carried to them, and left by the merchants who then go away, and coming again find that the natives have laid down the price [they are willing to give] for every article beside it.... Sofālī gold is well-known among the Zenj merchants."—Yāḳūt, Mu'jam al-Buldān, s.v.
In his article on the gold country, Yāḳūt describes the kind of dumb trade in which the natives decline to come face to face with the merchants at greater length. It is a practice that has been ascribed to a {850a}great variety of uncivilized races; e.g. in various parts of Africa; in the extreme north of Europe and of Asia; in the Clove Islands; to the Veddas of Ceylon, to the Poliars of Malabar, and (by Pliny, surely under some mistake) to the Seres or Chinese. See on this subject a note in Marco Polo, Bk. iv. ch. 21; a note by Mr. De B. Priaulx, in J. R. As. Soc., xviii. 348 (in which several references are erroneously printed); Tennent's Ceylon, i. 593 seqq.; Rawlinson's Herodotus, under Bk. iv. ch. 196.
c. 1330.—"Sofāla is situated in the country of the Zenj. According to the author of the Kánún, the inhabitants are Muslim. Ibn Ṡayd says that their chief means of subsistence are the extraction of gold and of iron, and that their clothes are of leopard-skin."—Abulfeda, Fr. Tr. i. 222.
" "A merchant told me that the town of Sofāla is a half month's march distant from Culua (Quiloa), and that from Sofāla to Yūfī (Nūfī) ... is a month's march. From Yūfī they bring gold-dust to Sofāla."—Ibn Batuta, ii. 192-3.
1499.—"Coming to Mozambique (i.e. Vasco and his squadron on their return) they did not desire to go in because there was no need, so they kept their course, and being off the coast of Çofala, the pilots warned the officers that they should be alert and ready to strike sail, and at night they should keep their course, with little sail set, and a good look-out, for just thereabouts there was a river belonging to a place called Çofala, whence there sometimes issued a tremendous squall, which tore up trees and carried cattle and all into the sea...."—Correa, Lendas, i. 134-135.
1516.—"... at xviii. leagues from them there is a river, which is not very large, whereon is a town of the Moors called Sofala, close to which town the King of Portugal has a fort. These Moors established themselves there a long time ago on account of the great trade in gold, which they carry on with the Gentiles of the mainland."—Barbosa, 4.
1523.—"Item—that as regards all the ships and goods of the said Realm of Urmuz, and its ports and vassals, they shall be secure by land and by sea, and they shall be as free to navigate where they please as vassals of the King our lord, save only that they shall not navigate inside the Strait of Mecca, nor yet to Çoffala and the ports of that coast, as that is forbidden by the King our lord...."—Treaty of Dom Duarto de Menezes, with the King of Ormuz, in Botelho, Tombo, 80.
1553.—"Vasco da Gama ... was afraid that there was some gulf running far inland, from which he would not be able to get out. And this apprehension made him so careful to keep well from the shore that he passed without even seeing the town of Çofala, so famous in these parts for the quantity of gold which the Moors procured there from the Blacks of the country by trade...."—Barros, I. iv. 3.
1572.—
"...
Camões, v. 73.
By Burton:
"off from the coast-line for a spell we stood,
till deep blue water 'neath our kelsons lay;
for frigid Notus, in his fainty mood,
was fain to drive us leewards to the Bay
made in that quarter by the crookèd shore,
whence rich Sofála sendeth golden ore."
1665.—
"Mombaza and Quiloa and Melind,
And Sofala, thought Ophir, to the realm
Of Congo, and Angola farthest south."
Paradise Lost, xi. 399 seqq.
Milton, it may be noticed, misplaces the accent, reading Sófala.
1727.—"Between Delagoa and Mosambique is a dangerous Sea-coast, it was formerly known by the names of Suffola and Cuama, but now by the Portuguese, who know that country best, is called Sena."—A. Hamilton, i. 8 [ed. 1744].
SOLA, vulg. SOLAR, s. This is properly Hind. sholā, corrupted by the Bengālī inability to utter the shibboleth, to solā, and often again into solar by English people, led astray by the usual "striving after meaning." Sholā is the name of the plant Aeschynomene aspera, L. (N.O. Leguminosae), and is particularly applied to the light pith of that plant, from which the light thick Sola topees, or pith hats, are made. The material is also used to pad the roofs of palankins, as a protection against the sun's power, and for various minor purposes, e.g. for slips of tinder, for making models, &c. The word, until its wide diffusion within the last 45 years, was peculiar to the Bengal Presidency. In the Deccan the thing is called bhenḍ, Mahr. bhenḍa, and in Tamil neṭṭi, ['breaking with a crackle.'] Solar hats are now often advertised in London. [Hats made of elder pith were used in S. Europe in the early 16th century. In Albert Dürer's Diary in the Netherlands (1520-21) we find: "Also Tomasin has given me a plaited hat of elder-pith" (Mrs. Heaton, Life of Albrecht Dürer, 269). Miss Eden, in 1839, speaks of Europeans wearing "broad white feather hats to keep off the sun" (Up the Country, ii. 56). {851a}Illustrations of the various shapes of Sola hats used in Bengal about 1854 will be found in Grant, Rural Life in Bengal, 105 seq.]
1836.—"I stopped at a fisherman's, to look at the curiously-shaped floats he used for his very large and heavy fishing-nets; each float was formed of eight pieces of sholā, tied together by the ends.... When this light and spongy pith is wetted, it can be cut into thin layers, which pasted together are formed into hats; Chinese paper appears to be made of the same material."—Wanderings of a Pilgrim, ii. 100.
1872.—"In a moment the flint gave out a spark of fire, which fell into the solá; the sulphur match was applied; and an earthen lamp...."—Govinda Samanta, i. 10.
1878.—"My solar topee (pith hat) was whisked away during the struggle."—Life in the Mofussil, i. 164.
1885.—"I have slipped a pair of galoshes over my ordinary walking-boots; and, with my solar topee (or sun helmet) on, have ridden through a mile of deserted streets and thronged bazaars, in a grilling sunshine."—A Professional Visit in Persia, St. James's Gazette, March 9.
[SOMBA, SOMBAY, s. A present. Malay sambah-an.
[1614.—"Sombay or presents."—Foster, Letters, ii. 112.
[1615.—"... concluded rather than pay the great Somba of eight hundred reals."—Ibid. iv. 43.]
SOMBRERO, s. Port. sumbreiro. In England we now understand by this word a broad-brimmed hat; but in older writers it is used for an umbrella. Summerhead is a name in the Bombay Arsenal (as M.-Gen. Keatinge tells me) for a great umbrella. I make no doubt that it is a corruption (by 'striving after meaning') of Sombreiro, and it is a capital example of Hobson-Jobson.
1503.—"And the next day the Captain-Major before daylight embarked armed with all his people in the boats, and the King (of Cochin) in his boats which they call tones (see DONEY) ... and in the tone of the King went his Sombreiros, which are made of straw, of a diameter of 4 palms, mounted on very long canes, some 3 or 4 fathoms in height. These are used for state ceremonial, showing that the King is there in person, as it were his pennon or royal banner, for no other lord in his realm may carry the like."—Correa, i. 378.
1516.—"And besides the page I speak of who carries the sword, they take another page who carries a sombreiro with a stand to shade his master, and keep the rain off {851b}him; and some of these are of silk stuff finely wrought, with many fringes of gold, and set with stones and seed pearl...."—Barbosa, Lisbon ed. 298.
1553.—"At this time Dom Jorge discerned a great body of men coming towards where he was standing, and amid them a sombreiro on a lofty staff, covering the head of a man on horseback, by which token he knew it to be some noble person. This sombreiro is a fashion in India coming from China, and among the Chinese no one may use it but a gentleman, for it is a token of nobility, which we may describe as a one-handed pallium (having regard to those which we use to see carried by four, at the reception of some great King or Prince on his entrance into a city)...."—Barros, III. x. 9. Then follows a minute description of the sombreiro or umbrella.
[1599.—"... a great broad sombrero or shadow in their hands to defend them in the Summer from the Sunne, and in the Winter from the Raine."—Hakl. II. i. 261 (Stanf. Dict.).
[1602.—In his character of D. Pedro Mascarenhas, the Viceroy, Couto says he was anxious to change certain habits of the Portuguese in India: "One of these was to forbid the tall sombreiros for warding off the rain and sun, to relieve men of the expence of paying those who carried them; he himself did not have one, but used a woollen umbrella with small cords (?), which they called for many years Mascarenhas. Afterwards finding the sun intolerable and the rain immoderate, he permitted the use of tall umbrellas, on the condition that private slaves should bear them, to save the wages of the Hindus who carry them, and are called boys de sombreiro (see BOY)."—Couto, Dec. VII. Bk. i. ch. 12.]
c. 1630.—"Betwixt towns men usually travel in Chariots drawn by Oxen, but in Towns upon Palamkeens, and with Sombreros de Sol over them."—Sir T. Herbert, ed. 1665, p. 46.
1657.—"A costé du cheval il y a un homme qui esvente Wistnou, afin qu'il ne reçoive point d'incommodité soit par les mouches, ou par la chaleur; et à chaque costé on porte deux Zombreiros, afin que le Soleil ne luise pas sur luy...."—Abr. Roger, Fr. Tr. ed. 1670, p. 223.
1673.—"None but the Emperor have a Sumbrero among the Moguls."—Fryer, 36.
1727.—"The Portuguese ladies ... sent to beg the Favour that he would pick them out some lusty Dutch men to carry their Palenqueens and Somereras or Umbrellas."—A. Hamilton, i. 338; [ed. 1744, i. 340].
1768-71.—"Close behind it, followed the heir-apparent, on foot, under a sambreel, or sunshade, of state."—Stavorinus, E.T. i. 87.
[1845.—"No open umbrellas or summer-heads allowed to pass through the gates."—Public Notice on Gates of Bombay Town, in Douglas, Glimpses of Old Bombay, 86.]
SOMBRERO, CHANNEL OF THE, n.p. The channel between the northern part of the Nicobar group, and the southern part embracing the Great and Little Nicobar, has had this name since the early Portuguese days. The origin of the name is given by A. Hamilton below. The indications in C. Federici and Hamilton are probably not accurate. They do not agree with those given by Horsburgh.
1566.—"Si passa per il canale di Nicubar, ouero per quello del Sombrero, li quali son per mezzo l'isola di Sumatra...."—C. Federici, in Ramusio, iii. 391.
1727.—"The Islands off this Part of the Coast are the Nicobars.... The northernmost Cluster is low, and are called the Carnicubars.... The middle Cluster is fine champain Ground, and all but one, well inhabited. They are called the Somerera Islands, because on the South End of the largest Island, is an Hill that resembleth the top of an Umbrella or Somerera."—A. Hamilton, ii. 68 [ed. 1744].
1843.—"Sombrero Channel, bounded on the north by the Islands of Katchull and Noncowry, and by Merve or Passage Island on the South side, is very safe and about seven leagues wide."—Horsburgh, ed. 1843, ii. 59-60.
SONAPARANTA, n.p. This is a quasi-classical name, of Indian origin, used by the Burmese Court in State documents and formal enumerations of the style of the King, to indicate the central part of his dominions; Skt. Suvarna (Pali Sona) prānta (or perhaps aparānta), 'golden frontier-land,' or something like that. There can be little doubt that it is a survival of the names which gave origin to the Chrysē of the Greeks. And it is notable, that the same series of titles embraces Tambadīpa ('Copper Island' or Region) which is also represented by the Chalcitis of Ptolemy. [Also see J. G. Scott, Upper Burma Gazetteer, i. pt. i. 103.]
(Ancient).—"There were two brothers resident in the country called Sunáparanta, merchants who went to trade with 500 wagons...."—Legends of Gotama Buddha, in Hardy's Manual of Buddhism, 259.
1636.—"All comprised within the great districts ... of Tsa-Koo, Tsa-lan, Laygain, Phoung-len, Kalé, and Thoung-thwot is constituted the Kingdom of Thuna-paranta. All within the great districts of Pagán, Ava, Penya, and Myen-Zain, is constituted the Kingdom of Tampadewa...." (&c.)—From an Inscription at the Great Pagoda of Khoug-Mhoo-dau, near Ava; from the MS. Journal of Major H. Burney, {852b}accompanying a Letter from him, dated 11th September, 1830, in the Foreign Office, Calcutta. Burney adds: "The Ministers told me that by Thunaparanta they mean all the countries to the northward of Ava, and by Tampadewa all to the southward. But this inscription shows that the Ministers themselves do not exactly understand what countries are comprised in Thunaparanta and Tāmpa-dewa."
1767.—"The King despotick; of great Merit, of great Power, Lord of the Countries Thonaprondah, Tompdevah, and Camboja, Sovereign of the Kingdom of Buraghmagh (Burma), the Kingdom of Siam and Hughen (?), and the Kingdom of Cassay."—Letter from the King of Burma, in Dalrymple, Or. Rep. i. 106.
1795.—"The Lord of Earth and Air, the Monarch of extensive Countries, the Sovereign of the Kingdoms of Sonahparindá, Tombadeva ... etc...."—Letter from the King to Sir John Shore, in Symes, 487.
1855.—"His great, glorious and most excellent Majesty, who reigns over the Kingdoms of Thunaparanta, Tampadeeva, and all the great umbrella-wearing chiefs of the Eastern countries, the King of the Rising Sun, Lord of the Celestial Elephants, and Master of many white Elephants, and great Chief of Righteousness...."—King's Letter to the Governor-General (Lord Dalhousie), Oct. 2, 1855.
SONTHALS, n.p. Properly Santāls, [the name being said to come from a place called Saont, now Silda in Mednipur, where the tribe remained for a long time (Dalton, Descr. Eth. 210-11)]. The name of a non-Aryan people belonging to the Kolarian class, extensively settled in the hilly country to the west of the Hoogly R. and to the south of Bhāgalpur, from which they extended to Balasore at interval, sometimes in considerable masses, but more generally much scattered. The territory in which they are chiefly settled is now formed into a separate district called Santāl Parganas, and sometimes Santalia. Their settlement in this tract is, however, quite modern; they have emigrated thither from the S.W. In Dr. F. Buchanan's statistical account of Bhāgalpur and its Hill people the Santāls are not mentioned. The earliest mention of this tribe that we have found is in Mr. Sutherland's Report on the Hill People, which is printed in the Appendix to Long. No date is given there, but we learn from Mr. Man's book, quoted below, that the date is 1817. [The word is, however, much older than this. Forbes (Or. Mem. ii. 374 seq.) gives an account {853a}taken from Lord Teignmouth of witch tests among the Soontaar.
[1798.—"... amongst a wild and unlettered tribe, denominated Soontaar, who have reduced the detection and trial of persons suspected of witchcraft to a system."—As. Res. iv. 359.]
1817.—"For several years many of the industrious tribes called Sonthurs have established themselves in these forests, and have been clearing and bringing into cultivation large tracts of lands...."—Sutherland's Report, quoted in Long, 569.
1867.—"This system, indicated and proposed by Mr. Eden,[247] was carried out in its integrity under Mr. George Yule, C.B., by whose able management, with Messrs. Robinson and Wood as his deputies, the Sonthals were raised from misery, dull despair, and deadly hatred of the government, to a pitch of prosperity which, to my knowledge, has never been equalled in any other part of India under the British rule. The Regulation Courts, with their horde of leeches in the shape of badly paid, and corrupt Amlah (Omlah) and pettifogging Mooktears, were abolished, and in their place a Number of active English gentlemen, termed Assistant Commissioners, and nominated by Mr. Yule, were set down among the Sonthals, with a Code of Regulations drawn up by that gentleman, the pith of which may be summed up as follows:—
"'To have no medium between the Sonthal and the Hakim, i.e. Assistant Commissioner.
"'To patiently hear any complaint made by the Sonthal from his own mouth, without any written petition or charge whatever, and without any Amlah or Court at the time.
"'To carry out all criminal work by the aid of the villagers themselves, who were to bring in the accused, with the witnesses, to the Hakim, who should immediately attend to their statements, and punish them, if found guilty, according to the tenor of the law.'
"These were some of the most important of the golden rules carried out by men who recognised the responsibility of their situation; and with an adored chief, in the shape of Yule, for their ruler, whose firm, judicious, and gentlemanly conduct made them work with willing hearts, their endeavours were crowned with a success which far exceeded the expectations of the most sanguine...."—Sonthalia and the Sonthals, by E. G. Man, Barrister-at-Law, &c. Calcutta, 1867, pp. 125-127.
SOODRA, SOODER, s. Skt. śudra, [usually derived from root śuć, 'to be afflicted,' but probably of non-Aryan origin]. The (theoretical) Fourth Caste of the Hindus. In South India, {853b}there being no claimants of the 2nd or 3rd classes, the highest castes among the (so-called) Śudras come next after the Brahmans in social rank, and śudra is a note of respect, not of the contrary as in Northern India.
1630.—"The third Tribe or Cast, called the Shudderies."—Lord, Display, &c., ch. xii.
1651.—"La quatrième lignée est celle des Soudraes; elle est composée du commun peuple: cette lignée a sous soy beaucoup et diverses familles, dont une chacune prétend surpasser l'autre...."—Abr. Roger, Fr. ed. 1670, p. 8.
[c. 1665.—"The fourth caste is called Charados or Soudra."—Tavernier, ed. Ball, ii. 184.
[1667.—"... and fourthly, the tribe of Seydra, or artisans and labourers."—Bernier, ed. Constable, 325.]
1674.—"The ... Chudrer (these are the Nayres)."—Faria y Sousa, ii. 710.
1717.—"The Brahmens and the Tschuddirers are the proper persons to satisfy your Enquiries."—Phillips, An Account of the Religion, &c., 14.
1858.—"Such of the Aborigines as yet remained were formed into a fourth class, the Çudra, a class which has no rights, but only duties."—Whitney, Or. and Ling. Studies, ii. 6.
1867.—"A Brahman does not stand aloof from a Soudra with a keener pride than a Greek Christian shows towards a Copt."—Dixon, New America, 7th ed. i. 276.
SOOJEE, SOOJY, s. Hind. sūjī, [which comes probably from Skt. śuci, 'pure']; a word curiously misinterpreted "the coarser part of pounded wheat") by the usually accurate Shakespear. It is, in fact, the fine flour, made from the heart of the wheat, used in India to make bread for European tables. It is prepared by grinding between two millstones which are not in close contact. [Sūjī "is a granular meal obtained by moistening the grain overnight, then grinding it. The fine flour passes through a coarse sieve, leaving the Suji and bran above. The latter is got rid of by winnowing, and the round, granular meal or Suji, composed of the harder pieces of the grain, remains" (Watt, Econ. Dict. VI. pt. iv. 167).] It is the semolina of Italy. Bread made from this was called in Low Latin simella; Germ. Semmelbrödchen, and old English simnel-cakes. A kind of porridge made with soojee {854a}is often called soojee simply. (See ROLONG.)
1810.—"Bread is not made of flour, but of the heart of the wheat, which is very fine, ground into what is called soojy.... Soojy is frequently boiled into 'stirabout' for breakfast, and eaten with milk, salt, and butter; though some of the more zealous may be seen to moisten it with porter."—Williamson, V.M. ii. 135-136.
1878.—"Sujee flour, ground coarse, and water."—Life in the Mofussil, i. 213.
SOORKY, s. Pounded brick used to mix with lime to form a hydraulic mortar. Hind. from Pers. surkhī, 'red-stuff.'
c. 1770.—"The terrace roofs and floors of the rooms are laid with fine pulverized stones, which they call zurkee; these are mixed up with lime-water, and an inferior kind of molasses, and in a short time grow as hard and as smooth, as if the whole were one large stone."—Stavorinus, E.T. i. 514.
1777.—"The inquiry verified the information. We found a large group of miserable objects confined by order of Mr. Mills; some were simply so; some under sentence from him to beat Salkey."—Report of Impey and others, quoted in Stephen's Nuncomar and Impey, ii. 201.
1784.—"One lack of 9-inch bricks, and about 1400 maunds of soorky."—Notifn. in Seton-Karr, i. 34; see also ii. 15.
1811.—"The road from Calcutta to Baracpore ... like all the Bengal roads it is paved with bricks, with a layer of sulky, or broken bricks over them."—Solvyns, Les Hindous, iii. The word is misused as well as miswritten here. The substance in question is khoa (q.v.).
SOORMA, s. Hind. from Pers. surma. Sulphuret of antimony, used for the purpose of darkening the eyes, kuḥl of the Arabs, the stimmi and stibium of the ancients. With this Jezebel "painted her eyes" (2 Kings, ix. 30; Jeremiah, iv. 30 R.V.) "With it, I believe, is often confounded the sulphuret of lead, which in N. India is called soormee (ee is the feminine termination in Hindust.), and used as a substitute for the former: a mistake not of recent occurrence only, as Sprengel says, 'Distinguit vero Plinius marem a feminâ'" (Royle, on Ant. of Hindu Medicine, 100). [See Watt, Econ. Dict. i. 271.]
[1766.—"The powder is called by them surma; which they pretend refreshes and cools the eye, besides exciting its lustre, by the ambient blackness."—Grose, 2nd ed. ii. 142.]
[1829.—"Soorma, or the oxide of antimony, is found on the western frontier."—Tod, Annals, Calcutta reprint, i. 13.
[1832.—"Sulmah—A prepared permanent black dye, from antimony...."—Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali, Observations, ii. 72.]
SOOSIE, s. Hind. from Pers. sūsī. Some kind of silk cloth, but we know not what kind. [Sir G. Birdwood (Industr. Arts, 246) defines sūsīs as "fine-coloured cloths, made chiefly at Battala and Sialkote, striped in the direction of the warp with silk, or cotton lines of a different colour, the cloth being called dokanni [dokhānī], 'in two stripes' if the stripe has two lines, if three, tinkanni [tīnkhānī], and so on." In the Punjab it is 'a striped stuff used for women's trousers. This is made of fine thread, and is one of the fabrics in which English thread is now largely used' (Francis, Mon. on Cotton Manufactures, 7). A silk fabric of the same name is made in the N.W.P., where it is classed as a variety of chārkhāna, or check (Yusuf Ali, Mon. on Silk, 93). Forbes Watson (Textile Manufactures, 85) speaks of Sousee as chiefly employed for trousering, being a mixture of cotton and silk. The word seems to derive its origin from Susa, the Biblical Shushan, the capital of Susiana or Elam, and from the time of Darius I. the chief residence of the Achaemenian kings. There is ample evidence to show that fabrics from Babylon were largely exported in early times. Such was perhaps the "Babylonish garment" found at Ai (Josh. vii. 21), which the R.V. marg. translates as a "mantle of Shinar". This a writer in Smith's Dict. of the Bible calls "robes trimmed with valuable furs, or the skins themselves ornamented with embroidery" (i. 452). These Babylonian fabrics have been often described (see Layard, Nineveh and Babylon, 537; Maspero, Dawn of Civ., 470, 758; Encycl. Bibl. ii. 1286 seq.; Frazer, Pausanias, iii. 545 seq.). An early reference to this old trade in costly cloths will be found in the quotation from the Periplus under CHINA, which has been discussed by Sir H. Yule (Introd. to Gill, River of Golden Sand, ed. 1883, p. 88 seq.). This Sūsī cloth appears in a log of 1746 as Soacie, and was known to the Portuguese in 1550 as Soajes (J. R. As. Soc., Jan. 1900, p. 158.)]
[1667.—"... 2 patch of ye finest with what colours you thinke handsome for my own wear Chockoles and susaes."—In Yule, Hedges' Diary, Hak. Soc. ii. cclxii.
[1690.—"It (Suratt) is renown'd ... for Sooseys...."—Ovington, 218.
[1714-20.—In an inventory of Sir J. Fellowes: "A Susa window-curtain."—2nd ser. N. & Q. vi. 244.]
1784.—"Four cassimeers of different colours; Patna dimity, and striped Soosies."—In Seton-Karr, i. 42.
SOPHY, n.p. The name by which the King of Persia was long known in Europe—"The Sophy," as the Sultan of Turkey was "The Turk" or "Grand Turk," and the King of Delhi the "Great Mogul." This title represented Sūfī, Safavī, or Safī, the name of the dynasty which reigned over Persia for more than two centuries (1449-1722, nominally to 1736). The first king of the family was Isma'il, claiming descent from 'Ali and the Imāms, through a long line of persons of saintly reputation at Ardebil. The surname of Sūfī or Safī assumed by Isma'il is generally supposed to have been taken from Shaikh Safī-ud-dīn, the first of his more recent ancestors to become famous, and who belonged to the class of Sūfīs or philosophic devotees. After Isma'il the most famous of the dynasty was Shāh Abbās (1585-1629).
c. 1524.—"Susiana, quae est Shushan Palatium illud regni Sophii."—Abraham Peritsol, in Hyde, Syntagma Dissertt. i. 76.
1560.—"De que o Sufi foy contente, e mandou gente em su ajuda."—Terceiro, ch. i.
" "Quae regiones nomine Persiae ei regnantur quem Turcae Chislibas, nos Sophi vocamus."—Busbeq. Epist. iii. (171).
1561.—"The Queenes Maiesties Letters to the great Sophy of Persia, sent by M. Anthonie Ienkinson.
"Elizabetha Dei gratia Angliae Franciae et Hiberinae Regina, &c. Potentissimo et inuictissimo Principi, Magno Sophi Persarum, Medorum, Hircanorum, Carmanorum, Margianorum, populorum cis et vltra Tygrim fluuium, et omnium intra Mare Caspium et Persicum Sinum nationum atque Gentium Imperatori salutem et rerum prosperarum foelicissimum incrementum."—In Hakl. i. 381.
[1568.—"The King of Persia (whom here we call the great Sophy) is not there so called, but is called the Shaugh. It were dangerous to call him by the name of Sophy, because that Sophy in the Persian tongue is a beggar, and it were as much as to call him The great beggar."—Geffrey Ducket, ibid. i. 447.]
1598.—"And all the Kings continued so with the name of Xa, which in Persia is a King, and Ishmael is a proper name, whereby Xa Ismael, and Xa Thamas are as much as to say King Ismael, and King Thamas, and of the Turkes and Rumes are called Suffy or Soffy, which signifieth a great Captaine."—Linschoten, ch. xxvii.; [Hak. Soc. i. 173].
1601.—"Sir Toby. Why, man, he's a very devil: I have not seen such a firago....
"They say, he has been fencer to the Sophy."—Twelfth Night, III. iv.
[c. 1610.—"This King or Sophy, who is called the Great Chaa."—Pyrard de Laval, Hak. Soc. ii. 253.]
1619.—"Alla porta di Sciah Sofì, si sonarono nacchere tutto il giorno: ed insomma tutta la città e tutto il popolo andò in allegrezza, concorrendo infinita gente alla meschita di Schia Sofì, a far Gratiarum actionem."—P. della Valle, i. 808.
1626.—
"Were it to bring the Great Turk bound in chains
Through France in triumph, or to couple up
The Sophy and great Prester-John together;
I would attempt it."
Beaum. & Fletch., The Noble Gentleman, v. 1.
c. 1630.—"Ismael at his Coronation proclaim'd himself King of Persia by the name of Pot-shaw (Padshaw)-Ismael-Sophy. Whence that word Sophy was borrowed is much controverted. Whether it be from the Armenian idiom, signifying Wooll, of which the Shashes are made that ennobled his new order. Whether the name was from Sophy his grandsire, or from the Greek word Sophos imposed upon Aydar at his conquest of Trebizond by the Greeks there, I know not. Since then, many have called the Kings of Persia Sophy's: but I see no reason for it; since Ismael's son, grand and great grandsons Kings of Persia never continued that name, till this that now reigns, whose name indeed is Soffee, but casuall."—Sir T. Herbert, ed. 1638, 286.
1643.—"Y avoit vn Ambassadeur Persien qui auoit esté enuoyé en Europe de la part du Grand Sophy Roy de Perse."—Mocquet, Voyages, 269.
1665.—
"As when the Tartar from his Russian foe,
By Astracan, over the snowy plains
Retires; or Bactrian Sophy, from the horns
Of Turkish crescent, leaves all waste beyond
The realm of Aladule, in his retreat
To Tauris or Casbeen...."
Paradise Lost, x. 431 seqq.
1673.—"But the Suffee's Vicar-General is by his Place the Second Person in the Empire, and always the first Minister of State."—Fryer, 338.
1681.—"La quarta parte comprehende el Reyno de Persia, cuyo Señor se llama en estos tiempos, el Gran Sophi."—Martinez, Compendio, 6.
1711.—"In Consideration of the Company's good Services ... they had half of the Customs of Gombroon given them, and their successors, by a Firman from the Sophi or Emperor."—Lockyer, 220.
1727.—"The whole Reign of the last Sophi or King, was managed by such Vermin, that the Ballowches and Mackrans ... threw off the Yoke of Obedience first, and in full Bodies fell upon their Neighbours in Caramania."—A. Hamilton, i. 108; [ed. 1744, i. 105].
1815.—"The Suffavean monarchs were revered and deemed holy on account of their descent from a saint."—Malcolm, H. of Pers. ii. 427.
1828.—"It is thy happy destiny to follow in the train of that brilliant star whose light shall shed a lustre on Persia, unknown since the days of the earlier Soofees."—J. B. Fraser, The Kuzzilbash, i. 192.
SOUBA, SOOBAH, s. Hind. from Pers. ṣūba. A large Division or Province of the Mogul Empire (e.g. the Ṣūbah of the Deccan, the Ṣūbah of Bengal). The word is also frequently used as short for Sūbadār (see SOUBADAR), 'the Viceroy' (over a ṣūba). It is also "among the Maraṭhas sometimes applied to a smaller division comprising from 5 to 8 ṭarafs" (Wilson).
c. 1594.—"In the fortieth year of his majesty's reign, his dominions consisted of 105 Sircars.... The empire was then parcelled into 12 grand divisions, and each was committed to the government of a Soobadar ... upon which occasion the Sovereign of the world distributed 12 Lacks of beetle. The names of the Soobahs were Allahabad, Agra, Owdh, Ajmeer, Ahmedabad, Bahar, Bengal, Dehly, Cabul, Lahoor, Multan, and Malwa: when his majesty conquered Berar, Khandeess, and Ahmednagur, they were formed into three Soobahs, increasing the number to 15."—Ayeen, ed. Gladwin, ii. 1-5; [ed. Jarrett, ii. 115].
1753.—"Princes of this rank are called Subahs. Nizam al muluck was Subah of the Decan (or Southern) provinces.... The Nabobs of Condanore, Cudapah, Carnatica, Yalore, &c., the Kings of Tritchinopoly, Mysore, Tanjore, are subject to this Subah-ship. Here is a subject ruling a larger empire than any in Europe, excepting that of the Muscovite."—Orme, Fragments, 398-399.
1760.—"Those Emirs or Nabobs, who govern great Provinces, are stiled Subahs, which imports the same as Lord-Lieutenants or Vice-Roys."—Memoirs of the Revolution in Bengal, p. 6.
1763.—"From the word Soubah, signifying a province, the Viceroy of this vast territory (the Deccan) is called Soubahdar, and by the Europeans improperly Soubah."—Orme, i. 35.
1765.—"Let us have done with this ringing of changes upon Soubahs; there's no end to it. Let us boldly dare to be Soubah ourselves...."—Holwell, Hist. Events, &c., i. 183.
1783.—"They broke their treaty with him, in which they stipulated to pay 400,000l. a year to the Subah of Bengal."—Burke's Speech on Fox's India Bill, Works, iii. 468.
1804.—"It is impossible for persons to have behaved in a more shuffling manner than the Soubah's servants have...."—Wellington, ed. 1837, iii. 11.
1809.—"These (pillars) had been removed from a sacred building by Monsieur Dupleix, when he assumed the rank of Soubah."—Lord Valentia, i. 373.
1823.—"The Delhi Sovereigns whose vast empire was divided into Soubahs, or Governments, each of which was ruled by a Soubahdar or Viceroy."—Malcolm, Cent. India, i. 2.
SOUBADAR, SUBADAR, s. Hind. from Pers. ṣūbadār, 'one holding a ṣūba' (see SOUBA).
a. The Viceroy, or Governor of a ṣūba.
b. A local commandant or chief officer.
c. The chief native officer of a company of Sepoys; under the original constitution of such companies, its actual captain.
a. See SOUBA.
b.—
1673.—"The Subidar of the Town being a Person of Quality ... he (the Ambassador) thought good to give him a Visit."—Fryer, 77.
1805.—"The first thing that the Subidar of Vire Rajendra Pettah did, to my utter astonishment, was to come up and give me such a shake by the hand, as would have done credit to a Scotsman."—Letter in Leyden's Life, 49.
c.—
1747.—"14th September.... Read the former from Tellicherry adviseing that ... in a day or two they shall despatch another Subidar with 129 more Sepoys to our assistance."—MS. Consultations at Fort St. David, in India Office.
1760.—"One was the Subahdar, equivalent to the Captain of a Company."—Orme, iii. 610.
c. 1785.—"... the Subahdars or commanding officers of the black troops."—Carraccioli, L. of Clive, iii. 174.
1787.—"A Troop of Native Cavalry on the present Establishment consists of 1 European Subaltern, 1 European Serjeant, 1 Subidar, 3 Jemadars, 4 Havildars, 4 Naiques (naik), 1 Trumpeter, 1 Farrier, and 68 Privates."—Regns. for the Hon. Comp.'s Black Troops on the Coast of Coromandel, &c., p. 6.
[SOUDAGUR, s. P.—H. saudāgar, Pers. saudā, 'goods for sale'; a merchant, trader; now very often applied to those who sell European goods in civil stations and cantonments.
[1608.—"... and kill the merchants (sodagares mercadores)."—Livras das Moncoẽs, i. 183.
[c. 1809.—"The term Soudagur, which implies merely a principal merchant, is here (Behar) usually given to those who keep what the English of India call Europe shops; that is, shops where all sorts of goods imported from Europe, and chiefly consumed by Europeans, are retailed."—Buchanan, Eastern India, i. 375.
[c. 1817.—"This sahib was a very rich man, a Soudagur...."—Mrs. Sherwood, Last Days of Boosy, 84.]
SOURSOP, s.
a. The fruit Anona muricata, L., a variety of the Custard apple. This kind is not well known on the Bengal side of India, but it is completely naturalised at Bombay. The terms soursop and sweetsop are, we believe, West Indian.
b. In a note to the passage quoted below, Grainger identifies the soursop with the suirsack of the Dutch. But in this, at least as regards use in the East Indies, there is some mistake. The latter term, in old Dutch writers on the East, seems always to apply to the Common Jack fruit, the 'sourjack,' in fact, as distinguished from the superior kinds, especially the champada of the Malay Archipelago.
a.—
1764.—
"... a neighbouring hill
Which Nature to the Soursop had resigned."
Grainger, Bk. 2.
b.—
1659.—"There is another kind of tree (in Ceylon) which they call Sursack ... which has leaves like a laurel, and bears its fruit, not like other trees on twigs from the branches, but on the trunk itself...." &c.—Saar, ed. 1672, p. 84.
1661.—Walter Schulz says that the famous fruit Jaka was called by the Netherlanders in the Indies Soorsack.—p. 236.
1675.—"The whole is planted for the most part with coco-palms, mangoes, and suursacks."—Ryklof van Goens, in Valentijn, Ceylon, 223.
1768-71.—"The Sursak-tree has a fruit of a similar kind with the durioon (durian), but it is not accompanied by such a fetid smell."—Stavorinus, E.T. i. 236.
1778.—"The one which yields smaller fruit, without seed, I found at Columbo, Gale, and several other places. The name by which it is properly known here is the Maldivian Sour Sack, and its use here is less universal than that of the other sort, which ... weighs 30 or 40 lbs."—Thunberg, E.T. iv. 255.
[1833.—"Of the eatable fruited kinds above referred to, the most remarkable are the sweetsop, sour sop, and cherimoyer...."—Penny Cycl. ii. 54.]
SOWAR, SUWAR, s. Pers. sawār, 'a horseman.' A native cavalry soldier; a mounted orderly. In the Greek provinces in Turkey, the word is familiar in the form σουβάρις, pl. σουβαρίδες, for a mounted gendarme. [The regulations for suwārs in the Mogul armies are given by Blochmann, Āīn, i. 244 seq.]
1824-5.—"... The sowars who accompanied him."—Heber, Orig. i. 404.
1827.—"Hartley had therefore no resource save to keep his eye steadily fixed on the lighted match of the sowar ... who rode before him."—Sir W. Scott, The Surgeon's Daughter, ch. xiii.
[1830.—"... Meerza, an Asswar well known on the Collector's establishment."—Or. Sport. Mag. reprint 1873, i. 390.]
SOWAR, SHOOTER-, s. Hind. from Pers. shutur-sawār, the rider of a dromedary or swift camel. Such riders are attached to the establishment of the Viceroy on the march, and of other high officials in Upper India. The word sowar is quite misused by the Great Duke in the passage below, for a camel-driver, a sense it never has. The word written, or intended, may however have been surwaun (q.v.)
[1815.—"As we approached the camp his oont-surwars (camel-riders) went ahead of us."—Journal, Marquess of Hastings, i. 337.]
1834.—"I ... found a fresh horse at Sufter Jung's tomb, and at the Kutub (cootub) a couple of riding camels and an attendant Shutur Suwar."—Mem. of Col. Mountain, 129.
[1837.—"There are twenty Shooter Suwars (I have not an idea how I ought to spell those words), but they are native soldiers mounted on swift camels, very much {858a}trapped, and two of them always ride before our carriage."—Miss Eden, Up the Country, i. 31.]
1840.—"Sent a Shuta Sarwar (camel driver) off with an express to Simla."—Osborne, Court and Camp of Runj. Singh, 179.
1842.—"At Peshawur, it appears by the papers I read last night, that they have camels, but no sowars, or drivers."—Letter of D. of Wellington, in Indian Administration of Ld. Ellenborough, 228.
1857.—"I have given general notice of the Shutur Sowar going into Meerut to all the Meerut men."—H. Greathed's Letters during Siege of Delhi, 42.
SOWARRY, SUWARREE, s. Hind. from Pers. sawārī. A cavalcade, a cortège of mounted attendants.
1803.—"They must have tents, elephants, and other sewary; and must have with them a sufficient body of troops to guard their persons."—A. Wellesley, in Life of Munro, i. 346.
1809.—"He had no sawarry."—Ld. Valentia, i. 388.
1814.—"I was often reprimanded by the Zemindars and native officers, for leaving the suwarree, or state attendants, at the outer gate of the city, when I took my evening excursion."—Forbes, Or. Mem. iii. 420; [2nd ed. ii. 372].
[1826.—"The 'aswary,' or suite of Trimbuckje, arrived at the palace."—Pandurang Hari, ed. 1873, i. 119.]
1827.—"Orders were given that on the next day all should be in readiness for the Sowarree, a grand procession, when the Prince was to receive the Begum as an honoured guest."—Sir Walter Scott, The Surgeon's Daughter, ch. xiv.
c. 1831.—"Je tâcherai d'éviter toute la poussière de ces immenses sowarris."—Jacquemont, Corresp. ii. 121.
[1837.—"The Raja of Benares came with a very magnificent surwarree of elephants and camels."—Miss Eden, Up the Country, i. 35.]
SOWARRY CAMEL, s. A swift or riding camel. See SOWAR, SHOOTER-.
1835.—"'I am told you dress a camel beautifully,' said the young Princess, 'and I was anxious to ... ask you to instruct my people how to attire a sawārī camel.' This was flattering me on a very weak point: there is but one thing in the world that I perfectly understand, and that is how to dress a camel."—Wanderings of a Pilgrim, ii. 36.
SOWCAR, s. Hind. sāhūkār; alleged to be from Skt. sādhu, 'right,' with the Hind. affix kār, 'doer'; Guj. {858b}Mahr. sāvakār. A native banker; corresponding to the Chetty of S. India.
1803.—"You should not confine your dealings to one soucar. Open a communication with every soucar in Poonah, and take money from any man who will give it you for bills."—Wellington, Desp., ed. 1837, ii. 1.
1826.—"We were also sahoukars, and granted bills of exchange upon Bombay and Madras, and we advanced moneys upon interest."—Pandurang Hari, 174; [ed. 1873, i. 251].
[In the following the word is confounded with Sowar:
[1877.—"It was the habit of the sowars, as the goldsmiths are called, to bear their wealth upon their persons."—Mrs. Guthrie, My Year in an Indian Fort, i. 294.]
SOY, s. A kind of condiment once popular. The word is Japanese si-yau (a young Japanese fellow-passenger gave the pronunciation clearly as sho-yu.—A. B.), Chin. shi-yu. [Mr. Platts (9 ser. N. & Q. iv. 475) points out that in Japanese as written with the native character soy would not be siyau, but siyau-yu; in the Romanised Japanese this is simplified to shoyu (colloquially this is still further reduced, by dropping the final vowel, to shoy or soy). Of this monosyllable only the so represents the classical siyau; the final consonant (y) is a relic of the termination yu. The Japanese word is itself derived from the Chinese, which at Shanghai is sze-yu, at Amoy, si-iu, at Canton, shi-yau, of which the first element means 'salted beans,' or other fruits, dried and used as condiments; the second element merely means 'oil.'] It is made from the beans of a plant common in the Himālaya and E. Asia, and much cultivated, viz. Glycine Soja, Sieb. and Zucc. (Soya hispida, Moench.), boiled down and fermented. [In India the bean is eaten in places where it is cultivated, as in Chutia Nāgpur (Watt, Econ. Dict. iii. 510 seq.)]
1679.—"... Mango and Saio, two sorts of sauces brought from the East Indies."—Journal of John Locke, in Ld. King's Life of L., i. 249.
1688.—"I have been told that soy is made with a fishy composition, and it seems most likely by the Taste; tho' a Gentleman of my Acquaintance who was very intimate with one that sailed often from Tonquin to Japan, from whence the true Soy comes, told me that it was made {859a}only with Wheat and a sort of Beans mixt with Water and Salt."—Dampier, ii. 28.
1690.—"... Souy, the choicest of all Sawces."—Ovington, 397.
1712.—"Hoc legumen in coquinâ Japonicâ utramque replet paginam; ex eo namque conficitur: tum puls Miso dicta, quae ferculis pro consistentiâ, et butyri loco additur, butyrum enim hôc coelô res ignota est; tum Sooju dictum embamma, quod nisi ferculis, certè frictis et assatis omnibus affunditur."—Kaempfer, Amoen. Exot. p. 839.
1776.—An elaborate account of the preparation of Soy is given by Thunberg, Travels, E.T. iv. 121-122; and more briefly by Kaempfer on the page quoted above.
[1900.—"Mushrooms shred into small pieces, flavoured with shoyu" (soy).—Mrs. Frazer, A Diplomatist's Wife in Japan, i. 238.]
SPIN, s. An unmarried lady; popular abbreviation of 'Spinster.' [The Port. equivalent soltera (soltiera) was used in a derogatory sense (Gray, note on Pyrard de Laval, Hak. Soc. ii. 128).]
SPONGE-CAKE, s. This well-known form of cake is called throughout Italy pane di Spagna, a fact that suggested to us the possibility that the English name is really a corruption of Spanish-cake. The name in Japan tends to confirm this, and must be our excuse for introducing the term here.
1880.—"There is a cake called kasateira resembling sponge-cake.... It is said to have been introduced by the Spaniards, and that its name is a corruption of Castilla."—Miss Bird's Japan, i. 235.
SPOTTED-DEER, s. Axis maculatus of Gray; [Cervus axis of Blanford (Mammalia, 546)]; Hind. chītal, Skt. chitra, 'spotted.'
1673.—"The same Night we travelled easily to Megatana, using our Fowling-Pieces all the way, being here presented with Rich Game, as Peacocks, Doves, and Pigeons, Chitrels, or Spotted Deer."—Fryer, 71.
[1677.—"Spotted Deare we shall send home, some by ye Europe ships, if they touch here."—Forrest, Bombay Letters, i. 140.]
1679.—"There being conveniency in this place for ye breeding up of Spotted Deer, which the Hon'ble Company doe every yeare order to be sent home for His Majesty, it is ordered that care be taken to breed them up in this Factory (Madapollam), to be sent home accordingly."—Ft. St. George Council {859b}(on Tour), 16th April, in Notes and Exts., Madras, 1871.
1682.—"This is a fine pleasant situation, full of great shady trees, most of them Tamarins, well stored with peacocks and Spotted Deer like our fallow-deer."—Hedges, Diary, Oct. 16; [Hak. Soc. i. 39].
SQUEEZE, s. This is used in Anglo-Chinese talk for an illegal exaction. It is, we suppose, the translation of a Chinese expression. It corresponds to the malatolta of the Middle Ages, and to many other slang phrases in many tongues.
1882.—"If the licence (of the Hong merchants) ... was costly, it secured to them uninterrupted and extraordinary pecuniary advantages; but on the other hand it subjected them to 'calls' or 'squeezes' for contributions to public works, ... for the relief of districts suffering from scarcity ... as well as for the often imaginary ... damage caused by the overflowing of the 'Yangtse Keang' or the 'Yellow River.'"—The Fankwae at Canton, p. 36.
STATION, s. A word of constant recurrence in Anglo-Indian colloquial. It is the usual designation of the place where the English officials of a district, or the officers of a garrison (not in a fortress) reside. Also the aggregate society of such a place.
[1832.—"The nobles and gentlemen are frequently invited to witness a 'Station ball.'..."—Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali, Observations, i. 196.]
1866.—
"And if I told how much I ate at one Mofussil station,
I'm sure 'twould cause at home a most extraordinary sensation."
Trevelyan, The Dawk Bungalow, in Fraser, lxxiii. p. 391.
" "Who asked the Station to dinner, and allowed only one glass of Simkin to each guest."—Ibid. 231.
STEVEDORE, s. One employed to stow the cargo of a ship and to unload it. The verb estivar [Lat. stipare] is used both in Sp. and Port. in the sense of stowing cargo, implying originally to pack close, as to press wool. Estivador in the sense of a wool-packer only is given in the Sp. Dictionaries, but no doubt has been used in every sense of estivar. See Skeat, s.v.
STICK-INSECT, s. The name commonly applied to certain orthopterous insects, of the family {860a}Phasmidae, which have the strongest possible resemblance to dry twigs or pieces of stick, sometimes 6 or 7 inches in length.
1754.—"The other remarkable animal which I met with at Cuddalore was the animated Stalk, of which there are different kinds. Some appear like dried straws tied together, others like grass...."—Ives, 20.
1860.—"The Stick-insect.—The Phasmidae or spectres ... present as close a resemblance to small branches, or leafless twigs, as their congeners do to green leaves...."—Tennent, Ceylon, i. 252.
[STICKLAC, s. Lac encrusted on sticks, which in this form is collected in the jungles of Central India.
[1880.—"Where, however, there is a regular trade in stick-lac, the propagation of the insect is systematically carried on by those who wish for a certain and abundant crop."—Ball, Jungle Life, 308.]
STINK-WOOD, s. Foetidia Mauritiana, Lam., a myrtaceous plant of Mauritius, called there Bois puant. "At the Carnival in Goa, one of the sports is to drop bits of this stink-wood into the pockets of respectable persons."—Birdwood (MS.).
STRIDHANA, STREEDHANA, s. Skt. stri-dhana, 'women's property.' A term of Hindu Law, applied to certain property belonging to a woman, which follows a law of succession different from that which regulates other property. The term is first to be found in the works of Jones and Colebrooke (1790-1800), but has recently been introduced into European scientific treatises. [See Mayne, Hindu Law, 541 seqq.]
1875.—"The settled property of a married woman ... is well known to the Hindoos under the name of stridhan."—Maine, Early Institutions, 321.
STUPA. See TOPE.
SUÁKIN, n.p. This name, and the melancholy victories in its vicinity, are too familiar now to need explanation. Arab. Sawákin.
c. 1331.—"This very day we arrived at the island of Sawākin. It is about 6 miles from the mainland, and has neither drinkable water, nor corn, nor trees. Water is brought in boats, and there are cisterns to collect rain water...."—Ibn Batuta, ii. 161-2.
1526.—"The Preste continued speaking with our people, and said to Don Rodrigo that he would have great pleasure and complete contentment, if he saw a fort of ours erected in Macuha, or in Çuaquem, or in Zyla."—Correa, iii. 42; [see Dalboquerque, Comm. ii. 229].
[c. 1590.—"... thence it (the sea) washes both Persia and Ethiopia where are Dahlak and Suakin, and is called (the Gulf of) Omán and the Persian Sea."—Āīn, ed. Jarrett, ii. 121.]
SUCKER-BUCKER, n.p. A name often given in N. India to Upper Sind, from two neighbouring places, viz., the town of Sakhar on the right bank of the Indus, and the island fortress of Bakkar or Bhakkar in the river. An alternative name is Roree-Bucker, from Rohrī, a town opposite Bakkar, on the left bank, the name of which is probably a relic of the ancient town of Arōr or Alōr, though the site has been changed since the Indus adopted its present bed. [See McCrindle, Invasion of India, 352 seqq.]
c. 1333.—"I passed 5 days at Lāharī ... and quitted it to proceed to Bakār. They thus call a fine town through which flows a canal derived from the river Sind."—Ibn Batuta, iii. 114-115.
1521.—Shah Beg "then took his departure for Bhakkar, and after several days' marching arrived at the plain surrounding Sakhar."—Turkhān Nāma, in Elliot, i. 311.
1554.—"After a thousand sufferings we arrived at the end of some days' journey, at Siāwan (Sehwan), and then, passing by Patara and Darilja, we entered the fortress of Bakr."—Sidi 'Ali, p. 136.
[c. 1590.—"Bhakkar (Bhukkar) is a notable fortress; in ancient chronicles it is called Mamṣúrah."—Āīn, ed. Jarrett, ii. 327.]
1616.—"Buckor, the Chiefe Citie, is called Buckor Succor."—Terry, [ed. 1777, p. 75].
1753.—"Vient ensuite Bukor, ou comme il est écrit dans la Géographie Turque, Peker, ville située sur une colline, entre deux bras de l'Indus, qui en font une île ... la géographie ... ajoute que Louhri (i.e. Rori) est une autre ville située vis-à-vis de cette île du côté meridional, et que Sekar, autrement Sukor, est en même position du còté septentrional."—D'Anville, p. 37.
SUCKET, s. Old English. Wright explains the word as 'dried sweetmeats or sugar-plums.' Does it not in the quotations rather mean loaf-sugar? [Palmer (Folk Etymol. 378) says that the original meaning was a 'slice of melon or gourd,' Ital. zuccata, 'a kind of meat made of Pumpions or {861a}Gourdes' (Florio) from zucca, 'a gourd or pumpkin,' which is a shortened form of cucuzza, a corruption of Lat. cucurbita (Diez). This is perhaps the same word which appears in the quotation from Linschoten below, where the editor suggests that it is derived from Mahr. sukaṭa, 'slightly dried, desiccated,' and Sir H. Yule suggests a corruption of H. sonṭh, 'dried ginger.']
[1537.—"... packed in a fraile, two little barrels of suckat...."—Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII. xii. pt. i. 451.]
1584.—"White sucket from Zindi" (i.e. Sind) "Cambaia, and China."—Barret, in Hakl. ii. 412.
[1598.—"Ginger by the Arabians, Persians and Turkes is called Gengibil (see GINGER), in Gusurate, Decan, and Bengala, when it is fresh and green Adrac, and when dried sukte."—Linschoten, Hak. Soc. ii. 79.]
c. 1620-30.—
"... For this,
This Candy wine, three merchants were undone;
These suckets brake as many more."
Beaum. and Fletch., The Little French Lawyer, i. 1.
SUCLÁT, SACKCLOTH, &c., s. Pers. saḳallāṭ, saḳallaṭ, saḳlaṭīn, saḳlāṭūn, applied to certain woollen stuffs, and particularly now to European broadcloth. It is sometimes defined as scarlet broad cloth; but though this colour is frequent, it does not seem to be essential to the name. [Scarlet was the name of a material long before it denoted a colour. In the Liberate Roll of 14 Hen. III. (1230, quoted in N. & Q. 8 ser. i. 129) we read of sanguine scarlet, brown, red, white and scarlet coloris de Marble.] It has, however, been supposed that our word scarlet comes from some form of the present word (see Skeat, s.v. Scarlet).[248] But the fact that the Arab. dictionaries give a form saḳirlāṭ must not be trusted to. It is a modern form, probably taken from the European word, [as according to Skeat, the Turkish iskerlat is merely borrowed from the Ital. scarlatto].
The word is found in the medieval literature of Europe in the form {861b}siclatoun, a term which has been the subject of controversy both as to etymology and to exact meaning (see Marco Polo, Bk. i. ch. 58, notes). Among the conjectures as to etymology are a derivation from Ar. ṣaḳl, 'polishing' (see SICLEEGUR); from Sicily (Ar. Ṣiḳiliya); and from the Lat. cyclas, cycladatus. In the Arabic Vocabulista of the 13th century (Florence, 1871), siḳlaṭūn is translated by ciclas. The conclusion come to in the note on Marco Polo, based, partly but not entirely, on the modern meaning of saḳallāṭ, was that saḳlāṭūn was probably a light woollen texture. But Dozy and De Jong give it as étoffe de soie, brochée d'or, and the passage from Edrisi supports this undoubtedly. To the north of India the name suklāt is given to a stuff imported from the borders of China.
1040.—"The robes were then brought, consisting of valuable frocks of saklátún of various colours...."—Baihaki, in Elliot, ii. 148.
c. 1150.—"Almeria (Almarīa) was a Musulman city at the time of the Moravidae. It was then a place of great industry, and reckoned, among others, 800 silk looms, where they manufactured costly robes, brocades, the stuffs known as Saḳlāṭūn Isfahānī ... and various other silk tissues."—Edrisi (Joubert), ii. 40.
c. 1220.—"Tabrīz. The chief city of Azarbaijān.... They make there the stuffs called 'attābī (see TABBY), Siḳlāṭūn, Khiṭābī, fine satins and other textures which are exported everywhere."—Yāḳūt, in Barbier de Meynard, i. 133.
c. 1370?—
"His heer, his berd, was lyk saffroun
That to his girdel raughte adoun
Hise shoos of Cordewane,
Of Brugges were his hosen broun
His Robe was of Syklatoun
That coste many a Jane."
Chaucer, Sir Thopas, 4 (Furnival, Ellesmere Text).
c. 1590.—"Suḳlāṭ-i-Rūmī o Farangī o Purtagālī"
(Broadcloth of Turkey, of Europe, and of Portugal)....—Āīn (orig.) i. 110. Blochmann renders 'Scarlet Broadcloth' (see above). [The same word, suḳlāṭī, is used later on of 'woollen stuffs' made in Kashmīr (Jarrett, Āīn, ii. 355).]
1673.—"Suffahaun is already full of London Cloath, or Sackcloath Londre, as they call it."—Fryer, 224.
" "His Hose of London Sackcloth of any Colour."—Ibid. 391.
[1840.—"... his simple dress of sooklaat and flat black woollen cap...."—Lloyd, Gerard, Narr. i. 167.]
1854.—"List of Chinese articles brought to India.... Suklat, a kind of camlet made of camel's hair."—Cunningham's Ladak, 242.
1862.—"In this season travellers wear garments of sheep-skin with sleeves, the fleecy side inwards, and the exterior covered with Sooklat, or blanket."—Punjab Trade Report, 57.
" "Broadcloth (Europe), ('Suklat,' 'Mahoot')."—Ibid. App. p. ccxxx.
SUDDEN DEATH. Anglo-Indian slang for a fowl served as a spatchcock, the standing dish at a dawk-bungalow in former days. The bird was caught in the yard, as the traveller entered, and was on the table by the time he had bathed and dressed.
[c. 1848.—"'Sudden death' means a young chicken about a month old, caught, killed, and grilled at the shortest notice."—Berncastle, Voyage to China, i. 193.]
SUDDER, adj., but used as s. Literally 'chief,' being Ar. ṣadr. This term had a technical application under Mahommedan rule to a chief Judge, as in the example quoted below. The use of the word seems to be almost confined to the Bengal Presidency. Its principal applications are the following:
a. Sudder Board. This is the 'Board of Revenue,' of which there is one at Calcutta, and one in the N.W. Provinces at Allahabad. There is a Board of Revenue at Madras, but not called 'Sudder Board' there.
b. Sudder Court, i.e. 'Sudder Adawlut' (ṣadr 'adālat). This was till 1862, in Calcutta and in the N.W.P., the chief court of appeal from the Mofussil or District Courts, the Judges being members of the Bengal Civil Service. In the year named the Calcutta Sudder Court was amalgamated with the Supreme Court (in which English Law had been administered by English Barrister-Judges), the amalgamated Court being entitled the High Court of Judiciary. A similar Court also superseded the Sudder Adawlut in the N.W.P.
c. Sudder Ameen, i.e. chief Ameen (q.v.). This was the designation of the second class of native Judge in the classification which was superseded in Bengal by Act XVI. of 1868, in Bombay by Act XIV. of 1869, and in Madras by Act III. of 1873. Under that system the highest rank of native {862b}Judge was Principal Sudder Ameen; the 2nd rank, Sudder Ameen; the 3rd, Moonsiff. In the new classification there are in Bengal Subordinate Judges of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd grade, and Munsiffs (see MOONSIFF) of 4 grades; in Bombay, Subordinate Judges of the 1st class in 3 grades, and 2nd class in 4 grades; and in Madras Subordinate Judges in 3 grades, and Munsiffs in 4 grades.
d. Sudder Station. The chief station of a district, viz. that where the Collector, Judge, and other chief civil officials reside, and where their Courts are.
c. 1340.—"The Ṣadr-Jihān ('Chief of the Word') i.e. the Ḳaḍī-al-Kuḍāt ('Judge of Judges') (CAZEE) ... possesses ten townships, producing a revenue of about 60,000 tankas. He is also called Ṣadr-al-Islām."—Shihābuddīn Dimishkī, in Notes et Exts. xiii. 185.
SUFEENA, s. Hind. safīna. This is the native corr. of subpoena. It is shaped, but not much distorted, by the existence in Hind. of the Ar. word safīna for 'a blank-book, a note-book.'
SUGAR, s. This familiar word is of Skt. origin. Sarkara originally signifies 'grit or gravel,' thence crystallised sugar, and through a Prakrit form sakkara gave the Pers. shakkar, the Greek σάκχαρ and σάκχαρον, and the late Latin saccharum. The Ar. is sukkar, or with the article as-sukkar, and it is probable that our modern forms, It. zucchero and succhero, Fr. sucre, Germ. Zucker, Eng. sugar, came as well as the Sp. azucar, and Port. assucar, from the Arabic direct, and not through Latin or Greek. The Russian is sakhar; Polish zukier; Hung. zukur. In fact the ancient knowledge of the product was slight and vague, and it was by the Arabs that the cultivation of the sugar-cane was introduced into Egypt, Sicily, and Andalusia. It is possible indeed, and not improbable, that palm-sugar (see JAGGERY) is a much older product than that of the cane. [This is disputed by Watt (Econ. Dict. vi. pt. i. p. 31), who is inclined to fix the home of the cane in E. India.] The original habitat of the cane is not known; there is only a slight and doubtful statement of Loureiro, who, in speaking of Cochin-China, uses the words {863a}"habitat et colitur," which may imply its existence in a wild state, as well as under cultivation, in that country. De Candolle assigns its earliest production to the country extending from Cochin-China to Bengal.
Though, as we have said, the knowledge which the ancients had of sugar was very dim, we are disposed greatly to question the thesis, which has been so confidently maintained by Salmasius and later writers, that the original saccharon of Greek and Roman writers was not sugar but the siliceous concretion sometimes deposited in bamboos, and used in medieval medicine under the name tabasheer (q.v.) (where see a quotation from Royle, taking the same view). It is just possible that Pliny in the passage quoted below may have jumbled up two different things, but we see no sufficient evidence even of this. In White's Latin Dict. we read that by the word saccharon is meant (not sugar but) "a sweet juice distilling from the joints of the bamboo." This is nonsense. There is no such sweet juice distilled from the joints of the bamboo; nor is the substance tabashīr at all sweet. On the contrary it is slightly bitter and physicky in taste, with no approach to sweetness. It is a hydrate of silica. It could never have been called "honey" (see Dioscorides and Pliny below); and the name of bamboo-sugar appears to have been given it by the Arabs merely because of some resemblance of its concretions to lumps of sugar. [The same view is taken in the Encycl. Brit. 9th ed. xxii. 625, quoting Not. et Extr., xxv. 267.] All the erroneous notices of σάκχαρον seem to be easily accounted for by lack of knowledge; and they are exactly paralleled by the loose and inaccurate stories about the origin of camphor, of lac, and what-not, that may be found within the boards of this book.
In the absence or scarcity of sugar, honey was the type of sweetness, and hence the name of honey applied to sugar in several of these early extracts. This phraseology continued down to the Middle Ages, at least in its application to uncrystallised products of the sugar-cane, and analogous substances. In the quotation from Pegolotti we apprehend that his three kinds of honey indicate honey, treacle, and a {863b}syrup or treacle made from the sweet pods of the carob-tree.
Sugar does not seem to have been in early Chinese use. The old Chinese books often mention shi-mi or 'stone-honey' as a product of India and Persia. In the reign of Taitsung (627-650) a man was sent to Gangetic India to learn the art of sugar-making; and Marco Polo below mentions the introduction from Egypt of the further art of refining it. In India now, Chīnī (Cheeny) (Chinese) is applied to the whiter kinds of common sugar; Miṣrī (Misree) or Egyptian, to sugar-candy; loaf-sugar is called ḳand.
c. A.D. 60.—
"Quâque ferens rapidum diviso gurgite fontem
Vastis Indus aquis mixtum non sentit Hydaspen:
Quique bibunt tenerâ dulcis ab arundine succos...."
Lucan, iii. 235.
" "Aiunt inveniri apud Indos mel in arundinum foliis, quod aut nos illius cœli, aut ipsius arundinis humor dulcis et pinguis gignat."—Seneca, Epist. lxxxiv.
c. A.D. 65.—"It is called σάκχαρον, and is a kind of honey which solidifies in India, and in Arabia Felix; and is found upon canes, in its substance resembling salt, and crunched by the teeth as salt is. Mixed with water and drunk, it is good for the belly and stomach, and for affections of the bladder and kidneys."—Dioscorides, Mat. Med. ii. c. 104.
c. A.D. 70.—"Saccharon et Arabia fert, sed laudatius India. Est autem mel in harundinibus collectum, cummium modo candidum, dentibus fragile, amplissimum nucis abellanae magnitudine, ad medicinae tantum usum."—Plin. Hist. Nat. xii. 8.
c. 170.—"But all these articles are hotter than is desirable, and so they aggravate fevers, much as wine would. But oxymeli alone does not aggravate fever, whilst it is an active purgative.... Not undeservedly, I think, that saccharum may also be counted among things of this quality...."—Galen, Methodus Medendi, viii.
c. 636.—"In Indicis stagnis nasci arundines calamique dicuntur, ex quorum radicibus expressum suavissimum succum bibunt. Vnde et Varro ait:
Indica non magno in arbore crescit arundo;
Illius et lentis premitur radicibus humor,
Dulcia qui nequeant succo concedere mella."
Isidori Hispalensis Originum, Lib. xvii. cap. vii.
c. 1220.—"Sunt insuper in Terra (Sancta) canamellae de quibus zucchara ex compressione eliquatur."—Jacobi Vitriaci, Hist. Jherosolym, cap. lxxxv.
1298.—"Bangala est une provence vers midi.... Il font grant merchandie, car il ont espi e galanga e gingiber e succare et {864a}de maintes autres chieres espices."—Marco Polo, Geog. Text, ch. cxxvi.
1298.—"Je voz di que en ceste provences" (Quinsai or Chekiang) "naist et se fait plus sucar que ne fait en tout le autre monde, et ce est encore grandissime vente."—Ibid. ch. cliii.
1298.—"And before this city" (a place near Fu-chau) "came under the Great Can these people knew not how to make fine sugar (zucchero); they only used to boil and skim the juice, which, when cold, left a black paste. But after they came under the Great Can some men of Babylonia" (i.e. of Cairo) "who happened to be at the Court proceeded to this city and taught the people to refine sugar with the ashes of certain trees."—Idem, in Ramusio, ii. 49.
c. 1343.—"In Cyprus the following articles are sold by the hundred-weight (cantara di peso) and at a price in besants: Round pepper, sugar in powder (polvere di zucchero) ... sugars in loaves (zuccheri in pani), bees' honey, sugar-cane honey, and carob-honey (mele d'ape, mele di cannameli, mele di carrube)...."—Pegolotti, 64.
" "Loaf sugars are of several sorts, viz. zucchero muchhera, caffettino, and bambillonia; and musciatto, and dommaschino; and the mucchera is the best sugar there is; for it is more thoroughly boiled, and its paste is whiter, and more solid, than any other sugar; it is in the form of the bambillonia sugar like this Δ; and of this mucchara kind but little comes to the west, because nearly the whole is kept for the mouth and for the use of the Soldan himself.
"Zucchero caffettino is the next best after the muccara ...
"Zucchero Bambillonia is the best next after the best caffettino.
"Zucchero musciatto is the best after that of Bambillonia.
* * * * *
"Zucchero chandi, the bigger the pieces are, and the whiter, and the brighter, so much is it the better and finer, and there should not be too much small stuff.
"Powdered sugars are of many kinds, as of Cyprus, of Rhodes, of the Cranco of Monreale, and of Alexandria; and they are all made originally in entire loaves; but as they are not so thoroughly done, as the other sugars that keep their loaf shape ... the loaves tumble to pieces, and return to powder, and so it is called powdered sugar ..." (and a great deal more).—Ibid. 362-365. We cannot interpret most of the names in the preceding extract. Bambillonia is 'Sugar of Babylon,' i.e. of Cairo, and Dommaschino of Damascus. Mucchera (see CANDY (SUGAR), the second quotation), Caffettino, and Musciatto, no doubt all represent Arabic terms used in the trade at Alexandria, but we cannot identify them.
c. 1345.—"J'ai vu vendre dans le Bengale ... un rithl (rottle) de sucre (al-sukkar), poids de Dihly, pour quatre drachmes."—Ibn Batuta, iv. 211.
1516.—"Moreover they make in this city (Bengala, i.e. probably Chittagong) much and good white cane sugar (açuquere branco de canas), but they do not know how to consolidate it and make loaves of it, so they wrap up the powder in certain wrappers of raw hide, very well stitched up; and make great loads of it, which are despatched for sale to many parts, for it is a great traffic."—Barbosa, Lisbon ed. 362.
[1630.—"Let us have a word or two of the prices of suger and suger candy."—Forrest, Bombay Letters, i. 5.]
1807.—"Chacun sait que par effet des regards de Farid, des monceaux de terre se changeaient en sucre. Tel est le motif du surnom de Schakar ganj, 'tresor de sucre' qui lui a été donné."—Arāish-i-Maḥfil, quoted by Garcin de Tassy, Rel. Mus. 95. (This is the saint, Farīd-uddīn Shakarganj (d. A.D. 1268) whose shrine is at Pāk Pattan in the Punjab.) [See Crooke, Popular Religion, &c. i. 214 seqq.]
1810.—"Although the sugar cane is supposed by many to be indigenous in India, yet it has only been within the last 50 years that it has been cultivated to any great extent.... Strange to say, the only sugar-candy used until that time" (20 years before the date of the book) "was received from China; latterly, however, many gentlemen have speculated deeply in the manufacture. We now see sugar-candy of the first quality manufactured in various places of Bengal, and I believe that it is at least admitted that the raw sugars from that quarter are eminently good."—Williamson, V.M. ii. 133.
SULTAN, s. Ar. sulṭān, 'a Prince, a Monarch.' But this concrete sense is, in Arabic, post-classical only. The classical sense is abstract 'dominion.' The corresponding words in Hebrew and Aramaic have, as usual, sh or s. Thus sholṭān in Daniel (e.g. vi. 26—"in the whole dominion of my kingdom") is exactly the same word. The concrete word, corresponding to sulṭān in its post-classical sense, is shallīṭ, which is applied to Joseph in Gen. xlii. 6—"governor." So Saladin (Yūsuf Salāh-ad-dīn) was not the first Joseph who was sultan of Egypt. ["In Arabia it is a not uncommon proper name; and as a title it is taken by a host of petty kinglets. The Abbaside Caliphs (as Al-Wásik ...) formerly created these Sultans as their regents. Al Tá'i bi'llah (A.D. 974) invested the famous Sabuktagin with the office ... Sabuktagin's son, the famous Mahmúd of the Ghaznavite dynasty in 1002, was the first to adopt 'Sultán' as an independent title some 200 years after the death of Harún-al-Rashíd" (Burton, Arab. Nights, i. 188.)]
c. 950.—"Ἐπὶ δὲ τῆς Βασιλείας Μιχαὴλ τοῦ ὑιοῦ Θεοφίλου ἀνῆλθεν ἀπὸ Ἀφρικῆς στόλος λϛʹ κομπαρίων, ἔχων κεφαλὴν τὸν τε Σολδανὸν καὶ τὸν Σάμαν καὶ τὸν Καλφοῦς, καὶ ἐχειρώσαντο διαφόρους πόλεις τῆς Δαλματίας."—Constant. Porphyrog., De Thematibus, ii. Thēma xi.
c. 1075 (written c. 1130).—"... οἳ καὶ καθελόντες Πέρσας τε καὶ Σαρακηνοὺς αὐτοὶ κύριοι τῆς Περσίδος γεγόνασι σουλτάνον τὸν Στραγγολίπιδα[249] ὀνομάσαντες, ὅπερ σημαίνει παρ' αὐτοῖς Βασιλεὺς καὶ παντοκράτωρ."—Nicephorus Bryennius, Comment. i. 9.
c. 1124.—"De divitiis Soldani mira referunt, et de incognitis speciebus quas in oriente viderunt. Soldanus dicitur quasi solus dominus, quia cunctis praeest Orientis principibus."—Ordericus Vitalis, Hist. Eccles. Lib. xi. In Paris ed. of Le Prevost, 1852, iv. 256-7.
1165.—"Both parties faithfully adhered to this arrangement, until it was interrupted by the interference of Sanjar-Shah ben Shah, who governs all Persia, and holds supreme power over 45 of its Kings. This prince is called in Arabic Sultan ul-Fars-al-Khabir (supreme commander of Persia)."—R. Benjamin, in Wright, 105-106.
c. 1200.—"Endementres que ces choses coroient einsi en Antioche, li message qui par Aussiens estoient alé au soudan de Perse por demander aide s'en retournoient."—Guillaume de Tyr, Old Fr. Tr. i. 174.
1298.—"Et quaint il furent là venus, adonc Bondocdaire qe soldan estoit de Babelonie vent en Armenie con grande host, et fait grand domajes por la contrée."—Marco Polo, Geog. Text, ch. xiii.
1307.—"Post quam vero Turchi occupaverunt terrã illã et habitaverũt ibidem, elegerũt dominũ super eos, et illum vocaverunt Soldã quod idem est quod rex in idiomate Latinorũ."—Haitoni Armeni de Tartaris Liber, cap. xiii. in Novus Orbis.
1309.—"En icelle grant paour de mort où nous estiens, vindrent à nous jusques à treize ou quatorze dou consoil dou soudan, trop richement appareillé de dras d'or et de soie, et nous firent demander (par un frere de l'Ospital qui savoit sarrazinois), de par le soudan, se nous vorriens estre delivre, et nous deimes que oil, et ce pooient il bien savoir."—Joinville, Credo. Joinville often has soudanc, and sometimes saudanc.
1498.—"Em este lugar e ilha a que chamão Moncobiquy estava hum senhor a que elles chamavam Colyytam que era como visorrey."—Roteiro de V. da Gama, 26.
c. 1586.—
"Now Tamburlaine the mighty Soldan comes,
And leads with him the great Arabian King."
Marlowe, Tamb. the Great, iv. 3.
[1596.—
"... this scimitar
That slew the Sophy and a Persian prince
That won three fields of Sultan Solyman."
Merchant of Venice, II. i. 26.]