Henry Yule

“ An a-muck; to run a-muck; to tilt; to run furiously and desperately at any one; to make a furious onset or charge in combat."— (Malay Dict.) [The standard Malay, according to Mr Skeat, is rather amok (mengāmok) .] Marsden says that the word rarely occurs in any other than the verbal form mengāmuk, 'to make a furious attack' (Mem. of a Malayan Family, 96) .
There is reason, however, to ascribe an Indian origin to the term; whilst the practice, apart from the term, is of no rare occurrence in Indian history. Thus Tod records some notable instances in the history of the Rājputs. ”

“ ART, EUROPEAN. We have heard much, and justly, of late years regarding the corruption of Indian art and artistic instinct by the employment of the artists in working for European patrons, and after European patterns. The copying of such patterns is no new thing, as we may see from this passage of the brightest of writers upon India whilst still under Asiatic government. ”

“ The term ananas has been Arabized, among the Indian pharmacists at least, as 'aīn-un-nās 'the eye of man'; in Burmese nan-na-si, and in Singhalese and Tamil as annāsi (see Moodeen Sheriff) .
We should recall attention to the fact that pine-apple was good English long before the discovery of America, its proper meaning being what we have now been driven (for the avoiding of confusion) to call a pine-cone. This is the only meaning of the term 'pine-apple' in Minsheu's Guide into Tongues (2nd ed. 1627) . And the ananas got this name from its strong resemblance to a pine-cone. ”

“ In every district of India the privilege of selling spirits is farmed to contractors, who manage the sale through retail shopkeepers. This is what is called the 'Abkary System.' The system has often been attacked as promoting tippling, and there are strong opinions on both sides. We subjoin an extract from a note on the subject, too long for insertion in integrity, by one of much experience in Bengal—Sir G. U. Yule.
June, 1879.—"Natives who have expressed their views are, I believe, unanimous in ascribing the increase of drinking to our Abkaree system. ”

“ De Gubernatis has indeed suggested that the word amouchi was derived from the Skt. amokshya, 'that cannot be loosed'; and this would be very consistent with several of the passages which we shall quote, in which the idea of being 'bound by a vow' underlies the conduct of the persons to whom the term was applicable both in Malabar and in the Archipelago. But amokshya is a word unknown to Malayālam, in such a sense at least.
We have seen a-muck derived from the Ar. aḥmaḳ, 'fatuous' [ (e.g. Ball, Jungle Life, 358) .] But this is etymology of the kind which scorns history. ”

“ ARAKAN, ARRACAN, n.p. This is an European form, perhaps through Malay [which Mr Skeat has failed to trace] , of Rakhaing, the name which the natives give themselves. This is believed by Sir Arthur Phayre [see Journ. As. Soc. Ben. xii. 24 seqq.] to be a corruption of the Skt. rākshasa, Pali rakkhaso, i.e. 'ogre' or the like, a word applied by the early Buddhists to unconverted tribes with whom they came in contact. It is not impossible that the Ἀργυρῆ of Ptolemy, which unquestionably represents Arakan, may disguise the name by which the country is still known to foreigners ”

“ There is an Ar. word, āsāfīriy, which the dicts. define as 'a kind of olive.' Burton (Ar. Nights, iii. 79) translates this as 'sparrow-olives,' and says that they are so called because they attract sparrows (āsāfīr) . It is perhaps possible that this name for a variety of olive may have been transferred to the pine-apple, and on reaching India, have been connected by a folk etymology with safarī applied to a 'travelled' fruit. ”

“ IV. iv. 13.
c. 1561.—In war between the Kings of Calicut and Cochin (1503) two princes of Cochin were killed. A number of these desperadoes who have been spoken of in the quotations were killed.... "But some remained who were not killed, and these went in shame, not to have died avenging their lords ... these were more than 200, who all, according to their custom, shaved off all their hair, even to the eyebrows, and embraced each other and their friends and relations, as men about to suffer death. In this case they are as madmen—known as amoucos—and count themselves as already among the dead. ”

“ Note that many European words of trade are from the Arabic; and that avarie is in Dutch avarij, averij, or haverij.— (See Dozy, Oosterlingen.)
AYAH, s. A native lady's-maid or nurse-maid. The word has been adopted into most of the Indian vernaculars in the forms āya or āyā, but it is really Portuguese (f. aia, 'a nurse, or governess'; m. aio, 'the governor of a young noble') . ”

“ Pine-apples used to cost a pardao (a coin difficult to determine the value of in those days) when first introduced in Malabar, says Linschoten, but "now there are so many grown in the country, that they are good cheape" (91) ; [Hak. Soc. ii. 19] . Athanasius Kircher, in the middle of the 17th century, speaks of the ananas as produced in great abundance in the Chinese provinces of Canton, Kiangsu and Fuhkien. In Ibn Muhammad Wali's H. of the Conquest of Assam, written in 1662, the pine-apples of that region are commended for size and flavour. ”

“ This word is the Ar. 'araḳ, properly 'perspiration,' and then, first the exudation or sap drawn from the date palm ('araḳ al-tamar) ; secondly any strong drink, 'distilled spirit,' 'essence,' etc. But it has spread to very remote corners of Asia. Thus it is used in the forms ariki and arki in Mongolia and Manchuria, for spirit distilled from grain. In India it is applied to a variety of common spirits; in S. India to those distilled from the fermented sap of sundry palms; in E. and N. India to the spirit distilled from cane-molasses, and also to that from rice. ”

“ The bird is very well described by Aelian, under the name of Κήλα, which is perhaps a relic of the still preserved vernacular one. It is described by another name, as one of the peculiarities of India, by Sultan Baber. See PELICAN.
"The feathers known as Marabou or Comercolly feathers, and sold in Calcutta, are the tail-coverts of this, and the Lept. Javanica, another and smaller species" (Jerdon) . The name marabout (from the Ar. murābit, 'quiet,' and thence 'a hermit,' through the Port. marabuto) seems to have been given to the bird in Africa on like reason to that of adjutant in India. ”

“ Mr W. W. Skeat writes—"The best explanation of the fact is perhaps that it was the Malay national method of committing suicide, especially as one never hears of Malays committing suicide in any other way. This form of suicide may arise from a wish to die fighting and thus avoid a 'straw death, a cow's death'; but it is curious that women and children are often among the victims, and especially members of the suicide's own family. ”

“ In 1787, the first year of Lord Cornwallis's government, in consequence of instructions from the Court of Directors, it was resolved that, with an exception as to the Courts at Moorshedabad, Patna, and Dacca, which were to be maintained independently, the office of judge in the Mofussil Courts was to be attached to that of the collection of the revenue; in fact, the offices of Judge and Collector, which had been divorced since 1774, were to be reunited. The duties of Magistrate and Judge became mere appendages to that of Collector; the administration of justice became a subordinate function ”

“ It may be noted as curious that among the Javanese (a people so remote in blood from what we understand by Aryan) , the word ārya is commonly used as an honorary prefix to the names of men of rank; a survival of the ancient Hindu influence on the civilisation of the island.
The earliest use of Aryan in an ethnic sense is in the Inscription on the tomb of Darius, in which the king calls himself an Aryan, and of Aryan descent, whilst Ormuzd is in the Median version styled, 'God of the Aryans.'
B.C. c. ”

“ This seems a nonsensical pretext for the name, especially as another American fruit, the Guava, is sometimes known in Bengal as the Safarī-ām, or 'travel mango.' It has been suggested by one of the present writers that these cases may present an uncommon use of the word safarī in the sense of 'foreign' or 'outlandish,' just as Clusius says of the pine-apple in India, "peregrinus est hic fructus," and as we begin this article by speaking of the ananas as having 'travelled' from its home in S. America. ”

“ The cut given is something like the conventional figure of a pine-apple, though it seems to us by no means very exact as such. Again, in Winter Jones's tr. of Conti (c. 1430) in India in the 15th Century, the traveller, speaking of a place called Panconia (read Pauconia apparently Pegu) is made to say: "they have pine-apples, oranges, chestnuts, melons, but small and green, white sandal-wood and camphor."
We cannot believe that in either place the object intended was the Ananas, which has carried that American name with it round the world. ”

“ And in defining Andor the same lexicographer says: "A portable vehicle in India, in those regions where they do not use beasts, as in Malabar and elsewhere. It is a kind of contrivance like an uncovered Andas, which men bear on their shoulders, &c.... Among us Andor is a machine with four arms in which images or reliques of the saints are borne in processions." This last term is not, as we had imagined an old Port. word. It is Indian, in fact Sanskrit, hindola, 'a swing, a swinging cradle or hammock,' whence also Mahr. ”

“ And we know from the Āīn that (about 1590) the ananas was habitually served at the table of Akbar, the price of one being reckoned at only 4 dams, or 1⁄10 of a rupee; whilst Akbar's son Jahāngīr states that the fruit came from the sea-ports in the possession of the Portuguese.— (See Āīn, i. 66–68.)
In Africa too, this royal fruit has spread, carrying the American name along with it. "The Mānānāzi [9] or pine-apple," says Burton, "grows luxuriantly as far as 3 marches from the coast (of Zanzibar) . It is never cultivated, nor have its qualities as a fibrous plant been discovered." ”

“ One often, in Anglo-Indian conversation, used to meet with the endeavour to distinguish the two well-known species of the Ganges as Crocodile and Alligator, but this, like other applications of popular and general terms to mark scientific distinctions, involves fallacy, as in the cases of 'panther, leopard,' 'camel, dromedary,' 'attorney, solicitor,' and so forth. The two kinds of Gangetic crocodile were known to Aelian (c. 250 A.D.) , who writes: "It (the Ganges) breeds two kinds of crocodiles; one of these is not at all hurtful, while the other is the most voracious and cruel eater of flesh ”

“ In 1793 regular Courts were established under the British Government, and then the Sudder Adawlut (Ṣadr 'Adālat) became the chief Court of Appeal for each Presidency, and its work was done by several European (Civilian) Judges. That Court was, on the criminal side, termed Nizamut Adawlat, and on the civil side Dewanny Ad. At Madras and Bombay, Foujdarry was the style adopted in lieu of Nizamut. This system ended in 1863, on the introduction of the Penal Code, and the institution of the High Courts on their present footing. ”

“ Skeat believes that the a in abada and similar Malay words represents the Arabic article, which was commonly used in Spanish and Portuguese prefixed to Arabic and other native words.] It will be observed that more than one authority makes it the female rhinoceros, and in the dictionaries the word is feminine. But so Barros makes Ganda. [Mr W. W. Skeat suggests that the female was the more dangerous animal, or the one most frequently met with, as is certainly the case with the crocodile.] ”

“ Charnock built a bungalow there, and a flourishing bazar arose under his patronage, before the settlement of Calcutta had been determined on. Barrackpore is at this day best known to the natives by the name of Chanock."—The Bengal Obituary, Calc. p. 2.
ACHÁR, s. P. āchār, Malay ắchār, adopted in nearly all the vernaculars of India for acid and salt relishes. By Europeans it is used as the equivalent of 'pickles,' and is applied to all the stores of Crosse and Blackwell in that kind. ”

“ Oviedo, in H. of the (Western) Indies, fills 21⁄2 folio pages with an enthusiastic description of the pine-apple as first found in Hispaniola, and of the reason why it got this name (pina in Spanish, pigna in Ramusio's Italian, from which we quote) . We extract a few fragments.
1535.—"There are in this iland of Spagnuolo certain thistles, each of which bears a Pigna, and this is one of the most beautiful fruits that I have seen.... It has all these qualities in combination, viz. beauty of aspect, fragrance of colour, and exquisite flavour. ”

“ The name Āsām and sometimes Āshām is a form of Āhām or Āhom, a dynasty of Shan race, who entered the country in the middle ages, and long ruled it. Assam politically is now a province embracing much more than the name properly included.
c. 1590.—"The dominions of the Rajah of Asham join to Kamroop; he is a very powerful prince, lives in great state, and when he dies, his principal attendants, both male and female, are voluntarily buried alive with his corpse."—Gladwin's Ayeen (ed. 1800) ii. 3 ”

“ And some of them, about twenty, reckoning more highly of their honour, desired to turn their death to better account; and these separated, and found their way secretly to Calicut, determined to slay the king. But as it became known that they were amoucos, the city gave the alarm, and the King sent his servants to slay them as they slew others. But they like desperate men played the devil (fazião diabruras) before they were slain, and killed many people, with women and children. ”

“ We have adopted the word through the Portuguese; but it is not impossible that Western Asiatics got it originally from the Latin acetaria.— (See Plin. Hist. Nat. xix. 19) .
1563.—"And they prepare a conserve of it (Anacardium) with salt, and when it is green (and this they call Achar) , and this is sold in the market just as olives are with us."—Garcia, f. 17. 1596.—Linschoten in the Dutch gives the word correctly, but in the English version (Hak. Soc. ii. 26) it is printed Machar.
[1612.—"Achar none to be had except one jar."—Danvers, Letters, i. 230.] ”