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Supplemental Nights to the Book of the Thousand and One Nights — Volume 5 (of 6)

Note 487 — THE WOMAN WHO HUMOURED HER LOVER AT HER HUSBAND’S EXPENSE.[482]

Richard Francis Burton translation · Edition 2

In text “Maháshima-k” = good works, merits; in a secondary sense beard and mustachios. The word yard (etymologically a rod) is medical English, and the young student is often surprised to see, when a patient is told to show his yard, a mere inchlet of shrunken skin. [“Maháshim,” according to Bocthor, is a plural without singular, meaning: les parties de la génération. Pedro de Alcala gives “Hashshúm,” pl. “Hasháshim,” for the female parts, and both words are derived from the verb “hasham, yahshím,” he put to shame.—St.]

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