S (continued 5)

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 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.—

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 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?—

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 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 "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 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.—

" "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:

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 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.—

[1596.—

SUMATRA.

a. n.p. This name has been applied to the great island since about A.D. 1400. There can be no reasonable doubt that it was taken from the very similar name of one of the maritime principalities upon the north coast of the island, which seems to have originated in the 13th century. The seat of this principality, a town called Samudra, was certainly not far from Pasei, the Pacem of the early Portuguese writers, the Passir of some modern charts, and probably lay near the inner end of the Bay of Telo Samawe (see notes to Marco Polo, 2nd ed. ii. 276 seqq.). This view is corroborated by a letter from C. W. J. Wenniker (Bijdragen tot de Taal-Land-en Volkenkunde van Nederlandsch Indie, ser. iv. vol. 6. (1882), p. 298) from which we learn that in 1881 an official of Netherlands India, who was visiting Pasei, not far from that place, and on the left bank of the river (we presume the river which is shown in maps as entering the Bay of Telo Samawe near Pasei) came upon a kampong, or village, called Samudra. We cannot doubt that this is an indication of the site of the old capital.

The first mention of the name is probably to be recognised in Samara, the name given in the text of Marco Polo to one of the kingdoms of this coast, intervening between Basma, or Pacem, and Dagroian or Dragoian, which last seems to correspond with Pedir. This must have been the position of Samudra, and it is probable that d has disappeared accidentally from Polo's Samara. Malay legends give trivial stories to account for the etymology of the name, and others have been suggested; but in all probability it was the Skt. Samudra, the 'sea.' [See Miscellaneous Papers relating to Indo-China, 2nd ser. ii. 50; Leyden, Malay Annals, 65.] At the very time of the alleged foundation of the town a kingdom was flourishing at Dwāra Samudra in S. India (see DOOR SUMMUND).

The first authentic occurrence of the name is probably in the Chinese annals, which mention, among the Indian kingdoms which were prevailed on to send tribute to Kublai Khan, that of Sumutala. The chief of this State is called in the Chinese record Tu-han-pa-ti (Pauthier, Marc Pol, 605), which seems to exactly represent the Malay words Tuan-Pati, 'Lord Ruler.'

We learn next from Ibn Batuta that at the time of his visit (about the middle of the 14th century) the State of Sumuṭra, as he calls it, had become important and powerful in the Archipelago; and no doubt it was about that time or soon after, that the name began to be applied by foreigners to the whole of the great island, just as Lamori had been applied to the same island some centuries earlier, from Lāmbrī, which was then the State and port habitually visited by ships from India. We see that the name was so applied early in the following century by Nicolo Conti, who was in those seas apparently c. 1420-30, and who calls the island Shamuthera. Fra Mauro, who derived much information from Conti, in his famous World-Map, calls the island Isola Siamotra or Taprobane. The confusion with Taprobane lasted long.

When the Portuguese first reached those regions Pedir was the leading State upon the coast, and certainly no State known as Samudra or Sumatra then continued to exist. Whether the city continued to exist, even in decay, is obscure. The Āīn, quoted below, refers to the "port of Sumatra," but this may have been based on old information. Valentijn seems to recognise the existence of a place called Samudra or Samotdara, though it is not entered in his map. A famous mystic theologian who flourished under the great King of Achīn, Iskandar Muda, and died in 1630, bore the name of Shamsuddīn Shamatrānī, which seems to point to a place called Shamatra as his birthplace. And a distinct mention of "the island of Samatra" as named from "a city of this northern part" occurs in the soi-disant "Voyage which Juan Serano made when he fled from Malacca" in 1512, published by Lord Stanley of Alderley at the end of his translation of Barbosa. This man, on leaving Pedir and going down the coast, says: "I drew towards the south and south-east direction, and reached to another country and city which is called Samatra," and so on. Now this indicates the position in which the city of Sumatra must really have been, if it continued to exist. But, though this passage is not, all the rest of the narrative seems to be mere plunder from Varthema. Unless, indeed, the plunder was the other way; for there is reason to believe that Varthema never went east of Malabar.

There is, however, a like intimation in a curious letter respecting the Portuguese discoveries, written from Lisbon in 1515, by a German, Valentino Moravia (the same probably who published a Portuguese version of Marco Polo, at Lisbon, in 1502) and who shows an extremely accurate conception of Indian geography. He says: "The greatest island is that called by Marco Polo the Venetian Java Minor, and at present it is called Sumotra from a port of the said island" (see in De Gubernatis, Viagg. Ital. 391).

It is probable that before the Portuguese epoch the adjoining States of Pasei and Sumatra had become united. Mr. G. Phillips, of the Consular Service in China, was good enough to send to one of the present writers, when engaged on Marco Polo, a copy of an old Chinese chart showing the northern coast of the island, and this showed the town of Sumatra (Sumantala). It seemed to be placed in the Gulf of Pasei, and very near where Pasei itself still exists. An extract of a Chinese account "of about A.D. 1413" accompanied the map. This was fundamentally the same as that quoted below from Groeneveldt. There was a village at the mouth of the river called Talu-mangkin (qu. Telu-Samawe?). A curious passage also will be found below, extracted by the late M. Pauthier from the great Chinese Imperial Geography, which alludes to the disappearance of Sumatra from knowledge.

We are quite unable to understand the doubts that have been thrown upon the derivation of the name, given to the island by foreigners, from that of the kingdom of which we have been speaking (see the letter quoted above from the Bijdragen).

1298.—"So you must know that when you leave the Kingdom of Basma (Pacem) you come to another Kingdom called Samara on the same Island."—Marco Polo, Bk. iii. ch. 10.

c. 1300.—"Beyond it (Lāmūrī, or Lāmbrī, near Achīn) lies the country of Sūmūtra, and beyond that Darband Niās, which is a dependency of Java."—Rashīduddīn, in Elliot, i. 71.

c. 1323.—"In this same island, towards the south, is another Kingdom by name Sumoltra, in which is a singular generation of people."—Odoric, in Cathay, &c., i. 277.

c. 1346.—"... after a voyage of 25 days we arrived at the island of Jāwa" (i.e. the Java Minor of Marco Polo, or Sumatra). "... We thus made our entrance into the capital, that is to say into the city of Sumuthra. It is large and handsome, and is encompassed with a wall and towers of timber."—Ibn Batuta, iv. 228-230.

1416.—"Sumatra [Su-men-ta-la]. This country is situated on the great road of western trade. When a ship leaves Malacca for the west, and goes with a fair eastern wind for five days and nights, it first comes to a village on the sea-coast called Ta-lu-man; and anchoring here and going south-east for about 10 li (3 miles) one arrives at the said place.

"This country has no walled city. There is a large brook running out into the sea, with two tides every day; the waves at the mouth of it are very high, and ships continually founder there...."—Chinese work, quoted by Groeneveldt, p. 85.

c. 1430.—"He afterwards went to a fine city of the island Taprobana, which island is called by the natives Sciamuthera."—Conti, in India in XVth. Cent., 9.

1459.—"Isola Siamotra."—Fra Mauro.

1498.—"... Camatarra is of the Christians; it is distant from Calicut a voyage of 30 days with a good wind."—Roteiro, 109.

1510.—"Wherefore we took a junk and went towards Sumatra to a city called Pider."—Varthema, 228.

1522.—"... We left the island of Timor, and entered upon the great sea called Lant Chidol, and taking a west-south-west course, we left to the right and the north, for fear of the Portuguese, the island of Zumatra, anciently called Taprobana; also Pegu, Bengala, Urizza, Chelim (see KLING) where are the Malabars, subjects of the King of Narsinga."—Pigafetta, Hak. Soc. 159.

1572.—

By Burton:

c. 1590.—"The zabád (i.e. civet) which is brought from the harbour town of Sumatra, from the territory of Áchín, goes by the name of Sumatra zabád (chūn az bandar-i Sāmatrāī az muẓāfat-i Achīn awurdand, Sāmatrāī goyand)."—Āīn, Blochmann, i. 79, (orig. i. 93). [And see a reference to Lámri in Āīn, ed. Jarrett, iii. 48.]

1612.—"It is related that Raja Shaher-ul-Nawi (see SARNAU) was a sovereign of great power, and on hearing that Samadra was a fine and flourishing land he said to his warriors—which of you will take the Rajah of Samadra?"—Sijara Malayu, in J. Ind. Archip. v. 316.

c. **.—"Sou-men-t'ala est située au sud-ouest de Tchen-tching (la Cochin Chine) ... jusqu'à la fin du règne de Tching-tsou (in 1425), ce roi ne cessa d'envoyer son tribut à la cour. Pendant les années wen-hi (1573-1615) ce royaume se partagea en deux, dont le nouveau se nomma A-tchí.... Par la suite on n'en entendit plus parler."—Grande Geog. Impériale, quoted by Pauthier, Marc Pol, 567.

b.—

SUMATRA, s. Sudden squalls, precisely such as are described by Lockyer and the others below, and which are common in the narrow sea between the Malay Peninsula and the island of Sumatra, are called by this name.

1616.—"... it befel that the galliot of Miguel de Macedo was lost on the Ilha Grande of Malaca (?), where he had come to anchor, when a Samatra arose that drove him on the island, the vessel going to pieces, though the crew and most part of what she carried were saved."—Bocarro, Decada, 626.

1711.—"Frequent squalls ... these are often accompanied with Thunder and Lightning, and continue very fierce for Half an Hour, more or less. Our English Sailors call them Sumatras, because they always meet with them on the Coasts of this Island."—Lockyer, 56.

1726.—"At Malacca the streights are not above 4 Leagues broad; for though the opposite shore on Sumatra is very low, yet it may easily be seen on a clear Day, which is the Reason that the Sea is always as smooth as a Mill-pond, except it is ruffled with Squalls of Wind, which seldom come without Lightning, Thunder, and Rain, and though they come with great Violence, yet they are soon over, not often exceeding an Hour."—A. Hamilton, ii. 79, [ed. 1744].

1843.—"Sumatras, or squalls from the S. Westward, are often experienced in the S.W. Monsoon.... Sumatras generally come off the land during the first part of the night, and are sometimes sudden and severe, accompanied with loud thunder, lightning, and rain."—Horsburgh, ed. 1843, ii. 215.

[SUMJAO, v. This is properly the imp. of the H. verb samjhānā, 'to cause to know, warn, correct,' usually with the implication of physical coercion. Other examples of a similar formation will be found under PUCKEROW.

[1826.—"... in this case they apply themselves to sumjao, the defendant."—Pandurang Hari, ed. 1873, ii. 170.]

[SUMPITAN, s. The Malay blowing-tube, by means of which arrows, often poisoned, are discharged. The weapon is discussed under SARBATANE. The word is Malay sumpītan, properly 'a narrow thing,' from sumpit, 'narrow, strait.' There is an elaborate account of it, with illustrations, in Ling Roth, Natives of Sarawak and Br. N. Borneo, ii. 184 seqq. Also see Scott, Malayan Words, 104 seqq.

[c. 1630.—"Sempitans." See under UPAS.

[1841.—"In advancing, the sumpitan is carried at the mouth and elevated, and they will discharge at least five arrows to one compared with a musket."—Brooke, in Narrative of Events in Borneo and Celebes, i. 261.

[1883.—"Their (the Samangs') weapon is the sumpitan, a blow-gun, from which poisoned arrows are expelled."—Miss Bird, The Golden Chersonese, 16.]

SUNDA, n.p. The western and most mountainous part of the island of Java, in which a language different from the proper Javanese is spoken, and the people have many differences of manners, indicating distinction of race. In the 16th century, Java and Sunda being often distinguished, a common impression grew up that they were separate islands; and they are so represented in some maps of the 16th century, just as some medieval maps, including that of Fra Mauro (1459), show a like separation between England and Scotland. The name Sunda is more properly indeed that of the people than of their country. The Dutch call them Sundanese (Soendanezen). The Sunda country is considered to extend from the extreme western point of the island to Cheribon, i.e. embracing about one-third of the whole island of Java. Hinduism appears to have prevailed in the Sunda country, and held its ground longer than in "Java," a name which the proper Javanese restrict to their own part of the island. From this country the sea between Sumatra and Java got from Europeans the name of the Straits of Sunda. Geographers have also called the great chain of islands from Sumatra to Timor "the Sunda Islands."

[Mr. Whiteway adds: "There was another Sunda near Goa, but above the Ghāts, where an offspring of the Vijāyanagara family ruled. It was founded at the end of the 16th century, and in the 18th the Portuguese had much to do with it, till Tippoo Sultān absorbed it, and the ruler became a Portuguese pensioner."]

1516.—"And having passed Samatara towards Java there is the island of Sunda, in which there is much good pepper, and it has a king over it, who they say desires to serve the King of Portugal. They ship thence many slaves to China."—Barbosa, 196.

1526.—"Duarte Coelho in a ship, along with the galeot and a foist, went into the port of Çunda, which is at the end of the island of Çamatra, on a separate large island, in which grows a great quantity of excellent pepper, and of which there is a great traffic from this port to China, this being in fact the most important merchandize exported thence. The country is very abundant in provisions, and rich in groves of trees, and has excellent water, and is peopled with Moors who have a Moorish king over them."—Correa, iii. 92.

1553.—"Of the land of Jaüa we make two islands, one before the other, lying west and east as if both on one parallel.... But the Jaos themselves do not reckon two islands of Jaoa, but one only, of the length that has been stated ... about a third in length of this island towards the west constitutes Sunda, of which we have now to speak. The natives of that part consider their country to be an island divided from Jaüa by a river, little known to our navigators, called by them Chiamo or Chenano, which cuts off right from the sea,^[250] all that third part of the land in such a way that when these natives define the limits of Jaüa they say that on the west it is bounded by the Island of Sunda, and separated from it by this river Chiamo, and on the east by the island of Bale, and that on the north they have the island of Madura, and on the south the unexplored sea ..." &c.—Barros, IV. i. 12.

1554.—"The information we have of this port of Calapa, which is the same as Çumda, and of another port called Bocaa, these two being 15 leagues one from the other, and both under one King, is to the effect that the supply of pepper one year with another will be xxx thousand quintals,^[251] that is to say, xx thousand in one year, and x thousand the next year; also that it is very good pepper, as good as that of Malauar, and it is purchased with cloths of Cambaya, Bengalla, and Choromandel."—A. Nunez, in Subsidios, 42.

1566.—"Sonda, vn Isola de' Mori appresso la costa della Giava."—Ces. Federici, in Ramusio, iii. 391v.

c. 1570.—

1598.—Linschoten does not recognize the two islands. To him Sunda is only a place in Java:—

"... there is a straight or narrow passage betweene Sumatra and Iaua, called the straight of Sunda, of a place so called, lying not far from thence within the Ile of Iaua.... The principall hauen in the Iland is Sunda Calapa,^[252] whereof the straight beareth the name; in this place of Sũda there is much Pepper."—p. 34.

SUNDERBUNDS, n.p. The well-known name of the tract of intersecting creeks and channels, swampy islands, and jungles, which constitutes that part of the Ganges Delta nearest the sea. The limits of the region so-called are the mouth of the Hoogly on the west, and that of the Megna (i.e. of the combined great Ganges and Brahmaputra) on the east, a width of about 220 miles. The name appears not to have been traced in old native documents of any kind, and hence its real form and etymology remain uncertain. Sundara-vana, 'beautiful forest'; Sundarī-vana, or -ban, 'forest of the Sundarī tree'; Chandra-ban, and Chandra-band, 'moon-forest' or 'moon-embankment'; Chanda-bhanda, the name of an old tribe of salt-makers;^[253] Chandra dīp-ban from a large zemindary called Chandra-dīp in the Bakerganj district at the eastern extremity of the Sunderbunds; these are all suggestions that have been made. Whatever be the true etymology, we doubt if it is to be sought in sundara or sundarī. [As to the derivation from the Sundarī tree which is perhaps most usually accepted, Mr. Beveridge (Man. of Bakarganj, 24, 167, 32) remarks that this tree is by no means common in many parts of the Bakarganj Sunderbunds; he suggests that the word means 'beautiful wood' and was possibly given by the Brahmans.] The name has never (except in one quotation below) been in English mouths, or in English popular orthography, Soonderbunds, but Sunderbunds, which implies (in correct transliteration) an original sandra or chandra, not sundara. And going back to what we conjecture may be an early occurrence of the name in two Dutch writers, we find this confirmed. These two writers, it will be seen, both speak of a famous Sandery, or Santry, Forest in Lower Bengal, and we should be more positive in our identification were it not that in Van der Broucke's map (1660) which was published in Valentijn's East Indies (1726) this Sandery Forest is shown on the west side of the Hoogly R., in fact about due west of the site of Calcutta, and a little above a place marked as Basanderi, located near the exit into the Hoogly of what represents the old Saraswati R., which enters the former at Sānkrāl, not far below the Botanical Gardens, and 5 or 6 miles below Fort William. This has led Mr. Blochmann to identify the Sanderi Bosch with the old Mahall Basandhari which appears in the Āīn as belonging to the Sirkār of Sulīmānābād (Gladwin's Ayeen, ii. 207, orig. i. 407; Jarrett, ii. 140; Blochm. in J.A.S.B. xlii. pt. i. p. 232), and which formed one of the original "xxiv. Pergunnas."^[254] Undoubtedly this is the Basanderi of V. den Broucke's map; but it seems possible that some confusion between Basanderi and Bosch Sandery (which would be Sandarban in the vernacular) may have led the map-maker to misplace the latter. We should gather from Schulz^[255] that he passed the Forest of Sandry about a Dutch mile below Sankral, which he mentions. But his statement is so nearly identical with that in Valentijn that we apprehend they have no separate value. Valentijn, in an earlier page, like Bernier, describes the Sunderbunds as the resort of the Arakan pirates, but does not give a name (p. 169).

1661.—"We got under sail again" (just after meeting the Arakan pirates) "in the morning early, and went past the Forest of Santry, so styled because (as has been credibly related) Alexander the Great with his mighty army was hindered by the strong rush of the ebb and flood at this place, from advancing further, and therefore had to turn back to Macedonia."—Walter Schulz, 155.

c. 1666.—"And thence it is" (from piratical raids of the Mugs, &c.) "that at present there are seen in the mouth of the Ganges, so many fine Isles quite deserted, which were formerly well peopled, and where no other Inhabitants are found but wild Beasts, and especially Tygers."—Bernier, E.T. 54; [ed. Constable, 442].

1726.—"This (Bengal) is the land wherein they will have it that Alexander the Great, called by the Moors, whether Hindostanders or Persians, Sulthaan Iskender, and in their historians Iskender Doulcarnain, was ... they can show you the exact place where King Porus held his court. The natives will prate much of this matter; for example, that in front of the Sanderie-Wood (Sanderie Bosch, which we show in the map, and which they call properly after him Iskenderie) he was stopped by the great and rushing streams."—Valentijn, v. 179.

1728.—"But your petitioners did not arrive off Sunderbund Wood till four in the evening, where they rowed backward and forward for six days; with which labour and want of provisions three of the people died."—Petition of Sheik Mahmud Ameen and others, to Govr. of Ft. St. Geo., in Wheeler, iii. 41.

1764.—"On the 11th Bhaudan, whilst the Boats were at Kerma in Soonderbund, a little before daybreak, Captain Ross arose and ordered the Manjee to put off with the Budgerow...."—Native Letter regarding Murder of Captain John Ross by a Native Crew. In Long, 383. This instance is an exception to the general remark made above that the English popular orthography has always been Sunder, and not Soonder-bunds.

1786.—"If the Jelinghy be navigable we shall soon be in Calcutta; if not, we must pass a second time through the Sundarbans."—Letter of Sir W. Jones, in Life, ii. 83.

" "A portion of the Sunderbunds ... for the most part overflowed by the tide, as indicated by the original Hindoo name of Chunderbund, signifying mounds, or offspring of the moon."—James Grant, in App. to Fifth Report, p. 260. In a note Mr. Grant notices the derivation from "Soondery wood," and "Soonder-ban," 'beautiful wood,' and proceeds: "But we adhere to our own etymology rather ... above all, because the richest and greatest part of the Sunderbunds is still comprized in the ancient Zemindarry pergunnah of Chunder deep, or lunar territory."

1792.—"Many of these lands, what is called the Sundra bunds, and others at the mouth of the Ganges, if we may believe the history of Bengal, was formerly well inhabited."—Forrest, V. to Mergui, Pref. p. 5.

1793.—"That part of the delta bordering on the sea, is composed of a labyrinth of rivers and creeks, ... this tract known by the name of the Woods, or Sunderbunds, is in extent equal to the principality of Wales."—Rennell, Mem. of Map of Hind., 3rd ed., p. 359.

1853.—"The scenery, too, exceeded his expectations; the terrible forest solitude of the Sunderbunds was full of interest to an European imagination."—Oakfield, i. 38.

[SUNGAR, s. Pers. sanga, sang, 'a stone.' A rude stone breastwork, such as is commonly erected for defence by the Afrīdīs and other tribes on the Indian N.W. frontier. The word has now come into general military use, and has been adopted in the S. African war.

[1857.—"... breastworks of wood and stone (murcha and sanga respectively)...."—Bellew, Journal of Mission, 127.

[1900.—"Conspicuous sungars are constructed to draw the enemy's fire."—Pioneer Mail, March 16.]

The same word seems to be used in the Hills in the sense of a rude wooden bridge supported by stone piers, used for crossing a torrent.

[1833.—"Across a deep ravine ... his Lordship erected a neat sangah, or mountain bridge of pines."—Mundy, Pen and Pencil Sketches, ed. 1858, p. 117.

[1871.—"A sungha bridge is formed as follows: on either side the river piers of rubble masonry, laced with cross-beams of timber, are built up; and into these are inserted stout poles, one above the other in successively projecting tiers, the interstices between the latter being filled up with cross-beams," &c.—Harcourt, Himalayan Districts of Kooloo, p. 67 seq.]

SUNGTARA, s. Pers. sangtara. The name of a kind of orange, probably from Cintra. See under ORANGE a quotation regarding the fruit of Cintra, from Abulfeda.

c. 1526.—"The Sengtereh ... is another fruit.... In colour and appearance it is like the citron (Tāranj), but the skin of the fruit is smooth."—Baber, 328.

c. 1590.—"Sirkar Silhet is very mountainous.... Here grows a delicious fruit called Soontara (sūntara) in colour like an orange, but of an oblong form."—Ayeen, by Gladwin, ii. 10; [Jarrett (ii. 124) writes Súntarah].

1793.—"The people of this country have infinitely more reason to be proud of their oranges, which appear to me to be very superior to those of Silhet, and probably indeed are not surpassed by any in the world. They are here called Santôla, which I take to be a corruption of Sengterrah, the name by which a similar species of orange is known in the Upper Provinces of India."—Kirkpatrick's Nepaul, 129.

1835.—"The most delicious oranges have been procured here. The rind is fine and thin, the flavour excellent; the natives call them 'cintra.'"—Wanderings of a Pilgrim, ii. 99.

SUNN, s. Beng. and Hind. san, from Skt. śaṇa; the fibre of the Crotalaria juncea, L. (N.O. Leguminosae); often called Bengal, or Country, hemp. It is of course in no way kindred to true hemp, except in its economic use. In the following passage from the Āīn the reference is to the Hibiscus canabinus (see Watt, Econ. Dict. ii. 597).

[c. 1590.—"Hemp grows in clusters like a nosegay.... One species bears a flower like the cotton-shrub, and this is called in Hindostan, sun-paut. It makes a very soft rope."—Ayeen, by Gladwin, ii. 89; in Blochmann (i. 87) Patsan.]

1838.—"Sunn ... a plant the bark of which is used as hemp, and is usually sown around cotton fields."—Playfair, Taleef-i-Shereef, 96.

[SUNNEE, SOONNEE, s. Ar. sunnī, which is really a Pers. form and stands for that which is expressed by the Ar. Ahlu's-Sunnah, 'the people of the Path,' a 'Traditionist.' The term applied to the large Mahommedan sect who acknowledge the first four Khalīfahs to have been the rightful descendants of the Prophet, and are thus opposed to the Sheeahs. The latter are much less numerous than the former, the proportion being, according to Mr. Wilfrid Blunt's estimate, 15 millions Shiahs to 145 millions of Sunnis.

[c. 1590.—"The Mahommedans (of Kashmīr) are partly Sunnies, and others of the sects of Aly and Noorbukhshy; and they are frequently engaged in wars with each other."—Ayeen, by Gladwin, ii. 125; ed. Jarrett, ii. 352.

[1623.—"The other two ... are Sonni, as the Turks and Moghol."—P. della Valle, Hak. Soc. i. 152.

[1812.—"A fellow told me with the gravest face, that a lion of their own country would never hurt a Sheyah ... but would always devour a Sunni."—Morier, Journey through Persia, 62.]

SUNNUD, s. Hind. from Ar. sanad. A diploma, patent, or deed of grant by the government of office, privilege, or right. The corresponding Skt.—H. is śāsana.

[c. 1590.—"A paper authenticated by proper signatures is called a sunnud...."—Ayeen, by Gladwin, i. 214; ed. Blochmann, i. 259.]

1758.—"They likewise brought sunnuds, or the commission for the nabobship."—Orme, Hist., ed. 1803, ii. 284.

1759.—"That your Petitioners, being the Bramins, &c. ... were permitted by Sunnud from the President and Council to collect daily alms from each shop or doocan (Doocaun) of this place, at 5 cowries per diem."—In Long, 184.

1776.—"If the path to and from a House ... be in the Territories of another Person, that Person, who always hath passed to and fro, shall continue to do so, the other Person aforesaid, though he hath a Right of Property in the Ground, and hath an attested Sunnud thereof, shall not have Authority to cause him any Let or Molestation."—Halhed, Code, 100-101.

1799.—"I enclose you sunnuds for pension for the Killadar of Chittledroog."—Wellington, i. 45.

1800.—"I wished to have traced the nature of landed property in Soondah ... by a chain of Sunnuds up to the 8th century."—Sir T. Munro, in Life, i. 249.

1809.—"This sunnud is the foundation of all the rights and privileges annexed to a Jageer (Jagheer)."—Harrington's Analysis, ii. 410.

SUNYÁSEE, s. Skt. sannyāsī, lit. 'one who resigns, or abandons,' scil. 'wordly affairs'; a Hindu religious mendicant. The name of Sunnyásee was applied familiarly in Bengal, c. 1760-75, to a body of banditti claiming to belong to a religious fraternity, who, in the interval between the decay of the imperial authority and the regular establishment of our own, had their head-quarters in the forest-tracts at the foot of the Himālaya. From these they used to issue periodically in large bodies, plundering and levying exactions far and wide, and returning to their asylum in the jungle when threatened with pursuit. In the days of Nawāb Mīr Kāsim 'Ali (1760-64) they were bold enough to plunder the city of Dacca; and in 1766 the great geographer James Rennell, in an encounter with a large body of them in the territory of Koch (see COOCH) Bihār, was nearly cut to pieces. Rennell himself, five years later, was employed to carry out a project which he had formed for the suppression of these bands, and did so apparently with what was considered at the time to be success, though we find the depredators still spoken of by W. Hastings as active, two or three years later.

[c. 200 A.D.—"Having thus performed religious acts in a forest during the third portion of his life, let him become a Sannyasi for the fourth portion of it, abandoning all sensual affection."—Manu, vi. 33.

[c. 1590.—"The fourth period is Sannyása, which is an extraordinary state of austerity that nothing can surpass.... Such a person His Majesty calls Sannyásí."—Āīn, ed. Jarrett, iii. 278.]

1616.—"Sunt autem Sanasses apud illos Brachmanes quidam, sanctimoniae opinione habentes, ab hominum scilicet consortio semoti in solitudine degentes et nonnunquã totũ nudi corpus in publicũ prodeuntes."—Jarric, Thes. i. 663.

1626.—"Some (an vnlearned kind) are called Sannases."—Purchas, Pilgrimage, 549.

1651.—"The Sanyasys are people who set the world and worldly joys, as they say, on one side. These are indeed more precise and strict in their lives than the foregoing."—Rogerius, 21.

1674.—"Saniade, or Saniasi, is a dignity greater than that of Kings."—Faria y Sousa, Asia Port. ii. 711.

1726.—"The San-yasés are men who, forsaking the world and all its fruits, betake themselves to a very strict and retired manner of life."—Valentijn, Choro. 75.

1766.—"The Sanashy Faquirs (part of the same Tribe which plundered Dacca in Cossim Ally's Time^[256]) were in arms to the number of 7 or 800 at the Time I was surveying Báár (a small Province near Boutan), and had taken and plundered the Capital of that name within a few Coss of my route.... I came up with Morrison immediately after he had defeated the Sanashys in a pitched Battle.... Our Escorte, which were a few Horse, rode off, and the Enemy with drawn Sabres immediately surrounded us. Morrison escaped unhurt, Richards, my Brother officer, received only a slight Wound, and fought his Way off; my Armenian Assistant was killed, and the Sepoy Adjutant much wounded.... I was put in a Palankeen, and Morrison made an attack on the Enemy and cut most of them to Pieces. I was now in a most shocking Condition indeed, being deprived of the Use of both my Arms, ... a cut of a Sable (sic) had cut through my right Shoulder Bone, and laid me open for nearly a Foot down the Back, cutting thro' and wounding some of my Ribs. I had besides a Cut on the left Elbow wh^ch took off the Muscular part of the breadth of a Hand, a Stab in the Arm, and a large Cut on the head...."—MS. Letter from James Rennell, dd. August 30, in possession of his grandson Major Rodd.

1767.—"A body of 5000 Sinnasses have lately entered the Sircar Sarong country; the Phousdar sent two companies of Sepoys after them, under the command of a serjeant ... the Sinnasses stood their ground, and after the Sepoys had fired away their ammunition, fell on them, killed and wounded near 80, and put the rest to flight...."—Letter to President at Ft. William, from Thomas Rumbold, Chief at Patna, dd. April 20, in Long, p. 526.

1773.—"You will hear of great disturbances committed by the Sinassies, or wandering Fackeers, who annually infest the provinces about this time of the year, in pilgrimage to Juggernaut, going in bodies of 1000 and sometimes even 10,000 men."—Letter of Warren Hastings, dd. February 2, in Gleig, i. 282.

" "At this time we have five battalions of Sepoys in pursuit of them."—Do. do., March 31, in Gleig, i. 294.

1774.—"The history of these people is curious.... They ... rove continually from place to place, recruiting their numbers with the healthiest children they can steal.... Thus they are the stoutest and most active men in India.... Such are the Senassies, the gypsies of Hindostan."—Do. do., dd. August 25, in Gleig, 303-4. See the same vol., also pp. 284, 296-7-8, 395.

1826.—"Being looked upon with an evil eye by many persons in society, I pretended to bewail my brother's loss, and gave out my intention of becoming a Sunyasse, and retiring from the world."—Pandurang Hari, 394; [ed. 1873, ii. 267; also i. 189].

SUPÁRA, n.p. The name of a very ancient port and city of Western India; in Skt. Sūrpāraka,^[257] popularly Supāra. It was near Wasāi (Baçaim of the Portuguese—see (1) Bassein)—which was for many centuries the chief city of the Konkan, where the name still survives as that of a well-to-do town of 1700 inhabitants, the channel by which vessels in former days reached it from the sea being now dry. The city is mentioned in the Mahābhārata as a very holy place, and in other old Sanskrit works, as well as in cave inscriptions at Kārlī and Nāsik, going back to the 1st and 2nd centuries of the Christian era. Excavations affording interesting Buddhist relics, were made in 1882 by Mr. (now Sir) J. M. Campbell (see his interesting notice in Bombay Gazetteer, xiv. 314-342; xvi. 125) and Pundit Indrajī Bhagwānlāl. The name of Supāra is one of those which have been plausibly connected, through Sophir, the Coptic name of India, with the Ophir of Scripture. Some Arab writers call it the Sofāla of India.

c. A.D. 80-90.—"Τοπικὰ δὲ ἐμπόρια κατὰ τὸ ἐξῆς κείμενα ἀπὸ Βαρυγάζων, Σούππαρα, καὶ Καλλιένα πόλις ..."—Periplus, § 52, ed. Fabricii.

c. 150.—

c. 460.—"The King compelling Wijayo and his retinue, 700 in number, to have the half of their heads shaved, and having embarked them in a vessel, sent them adrift on the ocean.... Wijayo himself landed at the port of Suppâraka...."—The Mahawanso, by Turnour, p. 46.

c. 500.—"Σουφείρ, χώρα, ἐν ᾗ οἱ πολύτιμοι λίθοι, καὶ ὁ χρυσός, ἐν Ἰνδίᾳ."—Hesychius, s.v.

c. 951.—"Cities of Hind ... Kambáya, Subárá, Sindán."—Istakhri, in Elliot, i. 27.

A.D. 1095.—"The Mahâmândalîka, the illustrious Anantadêva, the Emperor of the Koṅkan (Concan), has released the toll mentioned in this copper-grant given by the Sîlâras, in respect of every cart belonging to two persons ... which may come into any of the ports, Sri Sthânaka (Tana), as well as Nâgapur, Surpâraka, Chemuli (Chaul) and others, included within the Koṅkan Fourteen Hundred...."—Copper-Plate Grant, in Ind. Antiq. ix. 38.

c. 1150.—"Súbára is situated 1½ mile from the sea. It is a populous busy town, and is considered one of the entrepôts of India."—Edrisi, in Elliot, i. 85.

1321.—"There are three places where the Friars might reap a great harvest, and where they could live in common. One of these is Supera, where two friars might be stationed; and a second is in the district of Parocco (Broach), where two or three might abide; and the third is Columbus (Quilon)."—Letter of Fr. Jordanus, in Cathay, &c., 227.

c. 1330.—"Sufâlah Indica. Birunio nominatur Sûfârah.... De eo nihil commemorandum inveni."—Abulfeda, in Gildemeister, 189.

1538.—"Rent of the caçabe (Cusbah), of Çupara ... 14,122 fedeas."—S. Bothelho, Tombo, 175.

1803.—Extract from a letter dated Camp Soopara, March 26, 1803.

"We have just been paying a formal visit to his highness the peishwa," &c.—In Asiatic Annual Reg. for 1803, Chron. p. 99.

1846.—"Sopara is a large place in the Agasee mahal, and contains a considerable Mussulman population, as well as Christian and Hindoo ... there is a good deal of trade; and grain, salt, and garden produce are exported to Guzerat and Bombay."—Desultory Notes, by John Vaupell, Esq., in Trans. Bo. Geog. Soc. vii. 140.

SUPREME COURT. The designation of the English Court established at Fort William by the Regulation Act of 1773 (13 Geo. III. c. 63), and afterwards at the other two Presidencies. Its extent of jurisdiction was the subject of acrimonious controversies in the early years of its existence; controversies which were closed by 21 Geo. III. c. 70, which explained and defined the jurisdiction of the Court. The use of the name came to an end in 1862 with the establishment of the 'High Court,' the bench of which is occupied by barrister judges, judges from the Civil Service, and judges promoted from the native bar.

The Charter of Charles II., of 1661, gave the Company certain powers to administer the laws of England, and that of 1683 to establish Courts of Judicature. That of Geo. I. (1726) gave power to establish at each Presidency Mayor's Courts for civil suits, with appeal to the Governor and Council, and from these, in cases involving more than 1000 pagodas, to the King in Council. The same charter constituted the Governor and Council of each Presidency a Court for trial of all offences except high treason. Courts of Requests were established by charter of Geo. II., 1753. The Mayor's Court at Madras and Bombay survived till 1797, when (by 37 Geo. III. ch. 142) a Recorder's Court was instituted at each. This was superseded at Madras by a Supreme Court in 1801, and at Bombay in 1823.

SURA, s. Toddy (q.v.), i.e. the fermented sap of several kinds of palm, such as coco, palmyra, and wild-date. It is the Skt. sura, 'vinous liquor,' which has passed into most of the vernaculars. In the first quotation we certainly have the word, though combined with other elements of uncertain identity, applied by Cosmas to the milk of the coco-nut, perhaps making some confusion between that and the fermented sap. It will be seen that Linschoten applies sura in the same way. Bluteau, curiously, calls this a Caffre word. It has in fact been introduced from India into Africa by the Portuguese (see Ann. Marit. iv. 293).

c. 545.—"The Argell" (i.e. Nargil, or nargeela, or coco-nut) "is at first full of very sweet water, which the Indians drink, using it instead of wine. This drink is called Rhonco-sura,^[258] and is exceedingly pleasant."—Cosmas, in Cathay, &c., clxxvi.

[1554.—"Cura." See under ARRACK.]

1563.—"They grow two qualities of palm-tree, one kind for the fruit, and the other to give çura."—Garcia, f. 67.

1578.—"Sura, which is, as it were, vino mosto."—Acosta, 100.

1598.—"... in that sort the pot in short space is full of water, which they call Sura, and is very pleasant to drinke, like sweet whay, and somewhat better."—Linschoten, 101; [Hak. Soc. ii. 48].

1609-10.—"... A goodly country and fertile ... abounding with Date Trees, whence they draw a liquor, called Tarree (Toddy) or Sure...."—W. Finch, in Purchas, i. 436.

1643.—"Là ie fis boire mes mariniers de telle sorte que peu s'en falut qu'ils ne renuersassent notre almadie ou batteau: Ce breuvage estoit du sura, qui est du vin fait de palmes."—Mocquet, Voyages, 252.

c. 1650.—"Nor could they drink either Wine, or Sury, or Strong Water, by reason of the great Imposts which he laid upon them."—Tavernier, E.T. ii. 86; [ed. Ball, i. 343].

1653.—"Les Portugais appelent ce tari ou vin des Indes, Soure ... de cette liqueur le singe, et la grande chauue-souris ... sont extremement amateurs, aussi bien que les Indiens Mansulmans (sic), Parsis, et quelque tribus d'Indou...."—De la Boullaye-le-Gouz, ed. 1657, 263.

SURAT, n.p. In English use the name of this city is accented Surátt; but the name is in native writing and parlance generally Sŭrăt. In the Āīn, however (see below), it is written Sūrat; also in Ṣādiḳ Isfahānī (p. 106). Surat was taken by Akbar in 1573, having till then remained a part of the falling Mahommedan kingdom of Guzerat. An English factory was first established in 1608-9, which was for more than half a century the chief settlement of the English Company in Continental India. The transfer of the Chiefs to Bombay took place in 1687.

We do not know the origin of the name. Various legends on the subject are given in Mr. (now Sir J.) Campbell's Bombay Gazetteer (vol. ii.), but none of them have any probability. The ancient Indian Saurāshṭra was the name of the Peninsula of Guzerat or Kattywar, or at least of the maritime part of it. This latter name and country is represented by the differently spelt and pronounced Sōrath (see SŪRATH). Sir Henry Elliot and his editor have repeatedly stated the opinion that the names are identical. Thus: "The names 'Surat' and 'Sūrath' are identical, both being derived from the Sankrit Suráshtra; but as they belong to different places a distinction in spelling has been maintained. 'Surat' is the city; 'Súrath' is a pránt or district of Kattiwar, of which Junágarh is the chief town" (Elliot, v. 350; see also 197). Also: "The Sanskrit Suráshtra and Gurjjara survive in the modern names Surat and Guzerat, and however the territories embraced by the old terms have varied, it is hard to conceive that Surat was not in Suráshtra nor Guzerat in Gurjjara. All evidence goes to prove that the old and modern names applied to the same places. Thus Ptolemy's Surastrene comprises Surat...." (Dowson (?) ibid. i. 359). This last statement seems distinctly erroneous. Surat is in Ptolemy's Λάρικη, not in Συραστρηνή, which represents, like Saurāshtra, the peninsula. It must remain doubtful whether there was any connection between the names, or the resemblance was accidental. It is possible that continental Surat may have originally had some name implying its being the place of passage to Saurāshtra or Sorath.

Surat is not a place of any antiquity. There are some traces of the existence of the name ascribed to the 14th century, in passages of uncertain value in certain native writers. But it only came to notice as a place of any importance about the very end of the 15th century, when a rich Hindu trader, Gopi by name, is stated to have established himself on the spot, and founded the town. The way, however, in which it is spoken of by Barbosa previous to 1516 shows that the rise of its prosperity must have been rapid.

[Surat in English slang is equivalent to the French Rafiot, in the sense of 'no great shakes,' an adulterated article of inferior quality (Barrére, s.v. Rafiot). This perhaps was accounted for by the fact that "until lately the character of Indian cotton in the Liverpool market stood very low, and the name 'Surats,' the description under which the cotton of this province is still included, was a byword and a general term of contempt" (Berar Gazetteer, 226 seq.).]

1510.—"Don Afonso" (de Noronha, nephew of Alboquerque) "in the storm not knowing whither they went, entered the Gulf of Cambay, and struck upon a shoal in front of Çurrate. Trying to save themselves by swimming or on planks many perished, and among them Don Afonso."—Correa, ii. 29.

1516.—"Having passed beyond the river of Reynel, on the other side there is a city which they call Çurate, peopled by Moors, and close upon the river; they deal there in many kinds of wares, and carry on a great trade; for many ships of Malabar and other parts sail thither, and sell what they bring, and return loaded with what they choose...."—Barbosa, Lisbon ed. 280.

1525.—"The corjaa (Corge) of cotton cloths of Çuryate, of 14 yards each, is worth ... 250 fedeas."—Lembrança, 45.

1528.—"Heytor da Silveira put to sea again, scouring the Gulf, and making war everywhere with fire and sword, by sea and land; and he made an onslaught on Çurrate and Reynel, great cities on the sea-coast, and sacked them, and burnt part of them, for all the people fled, they being traders and without a garrison...."—Correa, iii. 277.

1553.—"Thence he proceeded to the bar of the river Tapty, above which stood two cities the most notable on that gulf. The first they call Surat, 3 leagues from the mouth, and the other Reiner, on the opposite side of the river and half a league from the bank.... The latter was the most sumptuous in buildings and civilisation, inhabited by warlike people, all of them Moors inured to maritime war, and it was from this city that most of the foists and ships of the King of Cambay's fleet were furnished. Surat again was inhabited by an unwarlike people whom they call Banyans, folk given to mechanic crafts, chiefly to the business of weaving cotton cloths."—Barros, IV. iv. 8.

1554.—"So saying they quitted their rowing-benches, got ashore, and started for Surrat."—Sidi 'Ali, p. 83.

1573.—"Next day the Emperor went to inspect the fortress.... During his inspection some large mortars and guns attracted his attention. Those mortars bore the name of Sulaimání, from the name of Sulaimán Sultán of Turkey. When he made his attempt to conquer the ports of Gujarát, he sent these ... with a large army by sea. As the Turks ... were obliged to return, they left these mortars.... The mortars remained upon the sea-shore, until Khudáwand Khán built the fort of Surat, when he placed them in the fort. The one which he left in the country of Súrath was taken to the fort of Junágarh by the ruler of that country."—Ṭabaḳāt-i-Akbarī, in Elliot, v. 350.

c. 1590.—"Sūrat is among famous ports. The river Taptī runs hard by, and at seven coss distance joins the salt sea. Rānīr on the other side of the river is now a port dependent on Sūrat, but was formerly a big city. The ports of Khandevī and Balsār are also annexed to Sūrat. Fruit, and especially the ananās, is abundant.... The sectaries of Zardasht, emigrant from Fārs, have made their dwelling here; they revere the Zhand and Pazhand and erect their dakhmas (or places for exposing the dead).... Through the carelessness of the agents of Government and the commandants of the troops (sipah-salārān, Sipah Selar), a considerable tract of this Sirkār is at present in the hands of the Frank, e.g. Daman, Sanjān (St. John's), Tārāpūr, Māhim, and Basai (see (1) Bassein), that are both cities and forts."—Āin, orig. i. 488; [ed. Jarrett, ii. 243].

[1615.—"To the Right Honourable Sir Thomas Roe ... these in Zuratt."—Foster, Letters, iii. 196.]

1638.—"Within a League of the Road we entred into the River upon which Surat is seated, and which hath on both sides a very fertile soil, and many fair gardens, with pleasant Country-houses, which being all white, a colour which it seems the Indians are much in love with, afford a noble prospect amidst the greenness whereby they are encompassed. But the River, which is the Tapte ... is so shallow at the mouth of it, that Barks of 70 or 80 Tun can hardly come into it."—Mandelslo, p. 12.

1690.—"Suratt is reckon'd the most fam'd Emporium of the Indian Empire, where all Commodities are vendible.... And the River is very commodious for the Importation of Foreign Goods, which are brought up to the City in Hoys and Yachts, and Country Boats."—Ovington, 218.

1779.—"There is some report that he (Gen. Goddard) is gone to Bender-Souret ... but the truth of this God knows."—Seir Mutaq. iii. 328.

SURATH, more properly Sōrath, and Sōreth, n.p. This name is the legitimate modern form and representative of the ancient Indian Saurāshṭra and Greek Syrastrēnē, names which applied to what we now call the Kattywar Peninsula, but especially to the fertile plains on the sea-coast. ["Suráshṭra, the land of the Sus, afterwards Sanskritized into Sauráshṭra the Goodly Land, preserves its name in Sorath the southern part of Káthiáváḍa. The name appears as Suráshṭra in the Mahábhárata and Pánini's Gaṇapátha, in Rudradáman's (A.D. 150) and Skandagupta's (A.D. 456) Girnár inscriptions, and in several Valabhi copper-plates. Its Prákrit form appears as Suraṭha in the Násik inscription of Gotamiputra (A.D. 150) and in later Prákrit as Suraṭhṭha in the Tirthakalpa of Jinapra-bhásuri of the 13th or 14th century. Its earliest foreign mention is perhaps Strabo's Saraostus and Pliny's Oratura" (Bombay Gazetteer, i. pt. i. 6)]. The remarkable discovery of one of the great inscriptions of Aśoka (B.C. 250) on a rock at Girnār, near Junāgarh in Saurāshtra, shows that the dominion of that great sovereign, whose capital was at Pataliputra (Παλιμβόθρα) or Patna, extended to this distant shore. The application of the modern form Sūrath or Sōrath has varied in extent. It is now the name of one of the four prānts or districts into which the peninsula is divided for political purposes, each of these prānts containing a number of small States, and being partly managed, partly controlled by a Political Assistant. Sorath occupies the south-western portion, embracing an area of 5,220 sq. miles.

c. A.D. 80-90.—"Ταύτης τὰ μὲν μεσόγεια τῇ Σκυθίᾳ συνορίζοντα Ἀβιρία καλεῖται, τὰ δὲ παραθαλάσσια Συραστρήνη."—Periplus, § 41.

c. 150.—

" "Πάλιν ἡ μὲν παρὰ τὸ λοιπὸν μέρος του Ἰνδοῦ πασα καλεῖται κοινῶς μὲν ... Ἰνδοσκυθία

* * * * * *

καὶ ἡ περὶ τὸν Κάνθι κόλπον ... Συραστρηνή."—Ibid. 55.

c. 545.—"Εἰσὶν οὐν τὰ λαμπρὰ ἐμπόρια τῆς Ἰνδικῆς ταῦτα, Σινδοῦ, Ὀῤῥοθα, Καλλιάνα, Σιβὼρ, ἡ Μαλὲ, πέντε ἐμπόρια ἔχουσα βάλλοντα τὸ πέπερι."—Cosmas, lib. xi. These names may be interpreted as Sind, Sorath, Calyan, Choul (?), Malabar.

c. 640.—"En quittant le royaume de Fa-la-pi (Vallabhi), il fit 500 li à l'ouest, et arriva au royaume de Sou-la-tch'a (Sourâchtra).... Comme ce royaume se trouve sur le chemin de la mer occidentale, tous les habitans profitent des avantages qu'offre la mer; ils se livrent au négoce, et à un commerce d'échange."—Hiouen-Thsang, in Pèl. Bouddh., iii. 164-165.

1516.—"Passing this city and following the sea-coast, you come to another place which has also a good port, and is called Çurati Mangalor,^[259] and here, as at the other, put in many vessels of Malabar for horses, grain, cloths, and cottons, and for vegetables and other goods prized in India, and they bring hither coco-nuts, Jagara (Jaggery), which is sugar that they make drink of, emery, wax, cardamoms, and every other kind of spice, a trade in which great gain is made in a short time."—Barbosa, in Ramusio, i. f. 296.

1573.—See quotation of this date under preceding article, in which both the names Surat and Sūrath, occur.

1584.—"After his second defeat Muzaffar Gujarátí retreated by way of Champánír, Bírpúr, and Jhaláwar, to the country of Súrath, and rested at the town of Gondal, 12 kos from the fort of Junágarh.... He gave a lac of Mahmúdís and a jewelled dagger to Amín Khán Ghorí, ruler of Súrath, and so won his support."—Ṭabaḳāt-i-Akbarí, in Elliot, v. 437-438.

c. 1590.—"Sircar Surat (Sūrath) was formerly an independent territory; the chief was of the Ghelolo tribe, and commanded 50,000 cavalry, and 100,000 infantry. Its length from the port of Ghogeh (Gogo) to the port of Aramroy (Arāmrāī) measures 125 cose; and the breadth from Sindehar (Sirdhār), to the port of Diu, is a distance of 72 cose."—Ayeen, by Gladwin, ii. 73; [ed. Jarrett, ii. 243].

1616.—"7 Soret, the chief city, is called Janagar; it is but a little Province, yet very rich; it lyes upon Guzarat; it hath the Ocean to the South."—Terry, ed. 1665, p. 354.

SURKUNDA, s. Hind. sarkanḍā, [Skt. śara, 'reed-grass,' kāṇḍa, 'joint, section']. The name of a very tall reed-grass, Saccharum Sara, Roxb., perhaps also applied to Saccharum procerum, Roxb. These grasses are often tall enough in the riverine plains of Eastern Bengal greatly to overtop a tall man standing in a howda on the back of a tall elephant. It is from the upper part of the flower-bearing stalk of surkunda that sirky (q.v.) is derived. A most intelligent visitor to India was led into a curious mistake about the name of this grass by some official, who ought to have known better. We quote the passage. ——'s story about the main branch of a river channel probably rests on no better foundation.

1875.—"As I drove yesterday with ——, I asked him if he knew the scientific name of the tall grass which I heard called tiger-grass at Ahmedabad, and which is very abundant here (about Lahore). I think it is a saccharum, but am not quite sure. 'No,' he said, 'but the people in the neighbourhood call it Sikunder's Grass, as they still call the main branch of a river 'Sikander's channel.' Strange, is it not?—how that great individuality looms through history."—Grant Duff, Notes of an Indian Journey, 105.

SURPOOSE, s. Pers. sar-posh, 'head-cover,' [which again becomes corrupted into our Tarboosh (tarbūsh), and 'Tarbrush' of the wandering Briton]. A cover, as of a basin, dish, hooka-bowl, &c.

1829.—"Tugging away at your hookah, find no smoke; a thief having purloined your silver chelam (see CHILLUM) and surpoose."—Mem. of John Shipp, ii. 159.

SURRAPURDA, s. Pers. sarā-parda. A canvas screen surrounding royal tents or the like (see CANAUT).

1404.—"And round this pavilion stood an enclosure, as it were, of a town or castle made of silk of many colours, inlaid in many ways, with battlements at the top, and with cords to strain it outside and inside, and with poles inside to hold it up.... And there was a gateway of great height forming an arch, with doors within and without made in the same fashion as the wall ... and above the gateway a square tower with battlements: however fine the said wall was with its many devices and artifices, the said gateway, arch and tower, was of much more exquisite work still. And this enclosure they call Zalaparda."—Clavijo, s. cxvi.

c. 1590.—"The Sarápardah was made in former times of coarse canvass, but his Majesty has now caused it to be made of carpeting, and thereby improved its appearance and usefulness."—Āīn, i. 54.

[1839.—"The camp contained numerous enclosures of serrapurdahs or canvass skreens...."—Elphinstone, Caubul, 2nd ed. i. 101.]

SURRINJAUM, s. Pers. saranjām, lit. 'beginning-ending.' Used in India for 'apparatus,' 'goods and chattels,' and the like. But in the Mahratta provinces it has a special application to grants of land, or rather assignments of revenue, for special objects, such as keeping up a contingent of troops for service; to civil officers for the maintenance of their state; or for charitable purposes.

[1823.—"It was by accident I discovered the deed for this tenure (for the support of troops), which is termed serinjam. The Pundit of Dhar shewed some alarm; at which I smiled, and told him that his master had now the best tenure in India...."—Malcolm, Central India, 2nd ed. i. 103.]

[1877.—"Government ... did not accede to the recommendation of the political agent immediately to confiscate his saringam, or territories."—Mrs. Guthrie, My Year in an Indian Fort, i. 166.]

SURRINJAUMEE, GRAM, s. Hind. grām-saranjāmī; Skt. grāma, 'a village,' and saranjām (see SURRINJAUM); explained in the quotation.

1767.—"Gram-serenjammee, or peons and pykes stationed in every village of the province to assist the farmers in the collections, and to watch the villages and the crops on the ground, who are also responsible for all thefts within the village they belong to ... (Rs.) 1,54,521 : 14."—Revenue Accounts of Burdwan. In Long, 507.

SURROW, SEROW, &c., s. Hind. sarāo. A big, odd, awkward-looking antelope in the Himālaya, 'something in appearance between a jackass and a Tahir' (Tehr or Him. wild goat).—Col. Markham in Jerdon. It is Nemorhoedus bubalina, Jerdon; [N. bubalinus, Blanford (Mammalia, 513)].

SURWAUN, s. Hind. from Pers. sārwān, sārbān, from sār in the sense of camel, a camel-man.

[1828.—"... camels roaring and blubbering, and resisting every effort, soothing or forcible, of their serwans to induce them to embark."—Mundy, Pen and Pencil Sketches, ed. 1858, p. 185.]

1844.—"... armed Surwans, or camel-drivers."—G. O. of Sir C. Napier, 93.

SUTLEDGE, n.p. The most easterly of the Five Rivers of the Punjab, the great tributaries of the Indus. Hind. Satlaj, with certain variations in spelling and pronunciation. It is in Skt. Satadru, 'flowing in a hundred channels,' Sutudru, Sutudri, Sitadru, &c., and is the Σαράδρος, Ζαράδρος, or Σαδάδρης of Ptolemy, the Sydrus (or Hesudrus) of Pliny (vi. 21).

c. 1020.—"The Sultán ... crossed in safety the Síhún (Indus), Jelam, Chandráha, Ubrá (Ráví), Bah (Bíyáh), and Sataldur...."—Al-'Utbí, in Elliot, ii. 41.

c. 1030.—"They all combine with the Satlader below Múltán, at a place called Panjnad, or 'the junction of the five rivers.'"—Al-Birūnī, in Elliot, i. 48. The same writer says: "(The name) should be written Shataludr. It is the name of a province in Hind. But I have ascertained from well-informed people that it should be Sataludr, not Shataldudr" (sic).—Ibid. p. 52.

c. 1310.—"After crossing the Panjáb, or five rivers, namely, Sind, Jelam, the river of Loháwar, Satlút, and Bíyah...."—Wassāf, in Elliot, iii. 36.

c. 1380.—"The Sultán (Fíroz Sháh) ... conducted two streams into the city from two rivers, one from the river Jumna, the other from the Sutlej."—Táríkh-i-Fíroz-Sháhí, in Elliot, iii. 300.

c. 1450.—"In the year 756 H. (1355 A.D.) the Sultán proceeded to Díbálpúr, and conducted a stream from the river Satladar, for a distance of 40 kos as far as Jhajar."—Táríkh-i-Mubárak Sháhí, in Elliot, iv. 8.

c. 1582.—"Letters came from Lahore with the intelligence that Ibrahím Husain Mirzá had crossed the Satlada, and was marching upon Dipálpúr."—Ṭabaḳāt-i-Akbarí, in Elliot, v. 358.

c. 1590.—"Sūbah Dihlī. In the 3rd climate. The length (of this Sūbah) from Palwal to Lodhīāna, which is on the bank of the river Satlaj, is 165 Kuroh."—Āīn, orig. i. 513; [ed. Jarrett, ii. 278].

1793.—"Near Moultan they unite again, and bear the name of Setlege, until both the substance and name are lost in the Indus."—Rennell, Memoir, 102.

In the following passage the great French geographer has missed the Sutlej:

1753.—"Les cartes qui ont précédé celles que j'ai composées de l'Arie, ou de l'Inde ... ne marquoient aucune rivière entre l'Hyphasis, ou Hypasis, dernier des fleuves qui se rendent dans l'Indus, et le Gemné, qui est le Jomanes de l'Antiquité.... Mais la marche de Timur a indiqué dans cette intervalle deux rivières, celle de Kehker et celle de Panipat. Dans un ancien itineraire de l'Inde, que Pline nous a conservé, on trouve entre l'Hyphasis et le Jomanes une rivière sous le nom d'Hesidrus à égale distance d'Hyphasis et de Jomanes, et qu'on a tout lieu de prendre pour Kehker."—D'Anville, p. 47.

SUTTEE, s. The rite of widow-burning; i.e. the burning of the living widow along with the corpse of her husband, as practised by people of certain castes among the Hindus, and eminently by the Rājpūts.

The word is properly Skt. satī, 'a good woman,' 'a true wife,' and thence specially applied, in modern vernaculars of Sanskrit parentage, to the wife who was considered to accomplish the supreme act of fidelity by sacrificing herself on the funeral pile of her husband. The application of this substantive to the suicidal act, instead of the person, is European. The proper Skt. term for the act is saha-gamana, or 'keeping company,' [saha-maraṇa, 'dying together'].^[260] A very long series of quotations in illustration of the practice, from classical times downwards, might be given. We shall present a selection.

We should remark that the word (satī or suttee) does not occur, so far as we know, in any European work older than the 17th century. And then it only occurs in a disguised form (see quotation from P. Della Valle). The term masti which he uses is probably mahā-satī, which occurs in Skt. Dictionaries ('a wife of great virtue'). Della Valle is usually eminent in the correctness of his transcriptions of Oriental words. This conjecture of the interpretation of masti is confirmed, and the traveller himself justified, by an entry in Mr. Whitworth's Dictionary of a word Masti-kalla used in Canara for a monument commemorating a sati. Kalla is stone and masti = mahā-satī. We have not found the term exactly in any European document older than Sir C. Malet's letter of 1787, and Sir W. Jones's of the same year (see below).

Suttee is a Brahmanical rite, and there is a Sanskrit ritual in existence (see Classified Index to the Tanjore MSS., p. 135a). It was introduced into Southern India with the Brahman civilisation, and was prevalent there chiefly in the Brahmanical Kingdom of Vijayanagar, and among the Mahrattas. In Malabar, the most primitive part of S. India, the rite is forbidden (Anāchāranirṇaya, v. 26). The cases mentioned by Teixeira below, and in the Lettres Édifiantes, occurred at Tanjore and Madura. A (Mahratta) Brahman at Tanjore told one of the present writers that he had to perform commemorative funeral rites for his grandfather and grandmother on the same day, and this indicated that his grandmother had been a satī.

The practice has prevailed in various regions besides India. Thus it seems to have been an early custom among the heathen Russians, or at least among nations on the Volga called Russians by Maṣ'ūdī and Ibn Fozlān. Herodotus (Bk. v. ch. 5) describes it among certain tribes of Thracians. It was in vogue in Tonga and the Fiji Islands. It has prevailed in the island of Bali within our own time, though there accompanying Hindu rites, and perhaps of Hindu origin,—certainly modified by Hindu influence. A full account of Suttee as practised in those Malay Islands will be found in Zollinger's account of the Religion of Sassak in J. Ind. Arch. ii. 166; also see Friedrich's Bali as in note preceding. [A large number of references to Suttee are collected in Frazer, Pausanias, iii. 198 seqq.]

In Diodorus we have a long account of the rivalry as to which of the two wives of Kēteus, a leader of the Indian contingent in the army of Eumenes, should perform suttee. One is rejected as with child. The history of the other terminates thus:

B.C. 317.—"Finally, having taken leave of those of the household, she was set upon the pyre by her own brother, and was regarded with wonder by the crowd that had run together to the spectacle, and heroically ended her life; the whole force with their arms thrice marching round the pyre before it was kindled. But she, laying herself beside her husband, and even at the violence of the flame giving utterance to no unbecoming cry, stirred pity indeed in others of the spectators, and in some excess of eulogy; not but what there were some of the Greeks present who reprobated such rites as barbarous and cruel...."—Diod. Sic. Biblioth. xix. 33-34.

c. B.C. 30.—

c. B.C. 20.—"He (Aristobulus) says that he had heard from some persons of wives burning themselves voluntarily with their deceased husbands, and that those women who refused to submit to this custom were disgraced."—Strabo, xv. 62 (E.T. by Hamilton and Falconer, iii. 112).

A.D. c. 390.—"Indi, ut omnes fere barbari uxores plurimas habent. Apud eos lex est, ut uxor carissima cum defuncto marito cremetur. Hae igitur contendunt inter se de amore viri, et ambitio summa certantium est, ac testimonium castitatis, dignam morte decerni. Itaque victrix in habitu ornatuque pristino juxta cadaver accubat, amplexans illud et deosculans et suppositos ignes prudentiae laude contemnens."—St. Jerome, Advers. Jovinianum, in ed. Vallars, ii. 311.

c. 851.—"All the Indians burn their dead. Serendib is the furthest out of the islands dependent upon India. Sometimes when they burn the body of a King, his wives cast themselves on the pile, and burn with him; but it is at their choice to abstain."—Reinaud, Relation, &c. i. 50.

c. 1200.—"Hearing the Raja was dead, the Parmâri became a satí:—dying she said—The son of the Jadavanî will rule the country, may my blessing be on him!"—Chand Bardai, in Ind. Ant. i. 227. We cannot be sure that satí is in the original, as this is a condensed version by Mr. Beames.

1298.—"Many of the women also, when their husbands die and are placed on the pile to be burnt, do burn themselves along with the bodies."—Marco Polo, Bk. iii. ch. 17.

c. 1322.—"The idolaters of this realm have one detestable custom (that I must mention). For when any man dies they burn him; and if he leave a wife they burn her alive with him, saying that she ought to go and keep her husband company in the other world. But if the woman have sons by her husband she may abide with them, an she will."—Odoric, in Cathay, &c., i. 79.

" Also in Zampa or Champa: "When a married man dies in this country his body is burned, and his living wife along with it. For they say that she should go to keep company with her husband in the other world also."—Ibid. 97.

c. 1328.—"In this India, on the death of a noble, or of any people of substance, their bodies are burned; and eke their wives follow them alive to the fire, and for the sake of worldly glory, and for the love of their husbands, and for eternal life, burn along with them, with as much joy as if they were going to be wedded. And those who do this have the higher repute for virtue and perfection among the rest."—Fr. Jordanus, 20.

c. 1343.—"The burning of the wife after the death of her husband is an act among the Indians recommended, but not obligatory. If a widow burns herself, the members of the family get the glory thereof, and the fame of fidelity in fulfilling their duties. She who does not give herself up to the flames puts on coarse raiment and abides with her kindred, wretched and despised for having failed in duty. But she is not compelled to burn herself." (There follows an interesting account of instances witnessed by the traveller.)—Ibn Batuta, ii. 138.

c. 1430.—"In Mediâ vero Indiâ, mortui comburuntur, cumque his, ut plurimum vivae uxores ... una pluresve, prout fuit matrimonii conventio. Prior ex lege uritur, etiam quae unica est. Sumuntur autem et aliae uxores quaedam eo pacto, ut morte funus suâ exornent, isque haud parvus apud eos honos ducitur ... submisso igne uxor ornatiori cultu inter tubas tibicinasque et cantus, et ipsa psallentis more alacris rogum magno comitatu circuit. Adstat interea et sacerdos ... hortando suadens. Cum circumierit illa saepius ignem prope suggestum consistit, vestesque exuens, loto de more prius corpore, tum sindonem albam induta, ad exhortationem dicentis in ignem prosilit."—N. Conti, in Poggius de Var. Fort. iv.

c. 1520.—"There are in this Kingdom (the Deccan) many heathen, natives of the country, whose custom it is that when they die they are burnt, and their wives along with them; and if these will not do it they remain in disgrace with all their kindred. And as it happens oft times that they are unwilling to do it, their Bramin kinsfolk persuade them thereto, and this in order that such a fine custom should not be broken and fall into oblivion."—Sommario de' Genti, in Ramusio, i. f. 329.

" "In this country of Camboja ... when the King dies, the lords voluntarily burn themselves, and so do the King's wives at the same time, and so also do other women on the death of their husbands."—Ibid. f. 336.

1522.—"They told us that in Java Major it was the custom, when one of the chief men died, to burn his body; and then his principal wife, adorned with garlands of flowers, has herself carried in a chair by four men ... comforting her relations, who are afflicted because she is going to burn herself with the corpse of her husband ... saying to them, 'I am going this evening to sup with my dear husband and to sleep with him this night.'... After again consoling them (she) casts herself into the fire and is burned. If she did not do this she would not be looked upon as an honourable woman, nor as a faithful wife."—Pigafetta, E.T. by Lord Stanley of A., 154.

c. 1566.—Cesare Federici notices the rite as peculiar to the Kingdom of "Bezeneger" (see BISNAGAR): "vidi cose stranie e bestiali di quella gentilitâ; vsano primamente abbrusciare i corpi morti cosi d'huomini come di donne nobili; e si l'huomo è maritato, la moglie è obligata ad abbrusciarsi viva col corpo del marito."—Orig. ed. p. 36. This traveller gives a good account of a Suttee.

1583.—"In the interior of Hindústán it is the custom when a husband dies, for his widow willingly and cheerfully to cast herself into the flames (of the funeral pile), although she may not have lived happily with him. Occasionally love of life holds her back, and then her husband's relations assemble, light the pile, and place her upon it, thinking that they thereby preserve the honour and character of the family. But since the country had come under the rule of his gracious Majesty [Akbar], inspectors had been appointed in every city and district, who were to watch carefully over these two cases, to discriminate between them, and to prevent any woman being forcibly burnt."—Abu'l Faẓl, Akbar Námah, in Elliot, vi. 69.

1583.—"Among other sights I saw one I may note as wonderful. When I landed (at Negapatam) from the vessel, I saw a pit full of kindled charcoal; and at that moment a young and beautiful woman was brought by her people on a litter, with a great company of other women, friends of hers, with great festivity, she holding a mirror in her left hand, and a lemon in her right hand...."—and so forth.—G. Balbi, f. 82v. 83.

1586.—"The custom of the countrey (Java) is, that whensoever the King doeth die, they take the body so dead and burne it, and preserve the ashes of him, and within five dayes next after, the wiues of the said King so dead, according to the custome and vse of their countrey, every one of them goe together to a place appointed, and the chiefe of the women which was nearest to him in accompt, hath a ball in her hand, and throweth it from her, and the place where the ball resteth, thither they goe all, and turne their faces to the Eastward, and every one with a dagger in their hand (which dagger they call a crise (see CREASE), and is as sharpe as a rasor), stab themselues in their owne blood, and fall a-groueling on their faces, and so ende their dayes."—T. Candish, in Hakl. iv. 338. This passage refers to Blambangan at the east end of Java, which till a late date was subject to Bali, in which such practices have continued to our day. It seems probable that the Hindu rite here came in contact with the old Polynesian practices of a like kind, which prevailed e.g. in Fiji, quite recently. The narrative referred to below under 1633, where the victims were the slaves of a deceased queen, points to the latter origin. W. Humboldt thus alludes to similar passages in old Javanese literature: "Thus we may reckon as one of the finest episodes in the Brata Yuda, the story how Satya Wati, when she had sought out her slain husband among the wide-spread heap of corpses on the battlefield, stabs herself by his side with a dagger."—Kawi-Sprache, i. 89 (and see the whole section, pp. 87-95).