Chapter CHARPOY to CHEECHEE of C by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

CHARPOY to CHEECHEE

CHARPOY, s. H. charpai, from P. chihar-pai (i.e. four-feet), the common Indian bedstead, sometimes of very rude materials, but in other cases handsomely wrought and painted. It is correctly described in the quotation from Ibn Batuta.

c. 1350.—“The beds in India are very light. A single man can carry one, and every traveller should have his own bed, which his slave carries about on his head. The bed consists of four conical legs, on which four staves are laid ; between they plait a sort of ribbon of silk or cotton. When you lie on it you need nothing else to render the bed sufficiently elastic.”— iii. 380.

c. 1540.—“Husain Khan Tashtdár was sent on some business from Bengal. He went on travelling night and day. Whenever sleep came over him he placed himself on a bed (chahar-pai) and the villagers carried him along on their shoulders.”—MS. quoted in Elliot, iv. 418.

1662.—“Turbans, long coats, trowsers, shoes, and sleeping on chárpáis, are quite unusual.”—H. of Mir Jumla’s Invasion of Assam, transl. by Blochmann, J.A.S.B. xli. pt. i. 80.

1876.—“A syce at Mozuffernuggar, lying asleep on a charpoy…was killed by a tame buck goring him in the side…it was supposed in play.”—Baldwin, Large and Small Game of Bengal, 195.

1883.—“After a gallop across country, he would rest on a charpoy, or country bed, and hold an impromptu levee of all the village folk.”—C. Raikes, in L. of L. Laurence, i. 57.

CHATTA, s. An umbrella ; H. chhata, chhatr ; Skt. chhatra.

c. 900.—“He is clothed in a waist-cloth, and holds in his hand a thing called a Jatra ; this is an umbrella made of peacock’s feathers.”—Reinaud, Relations, &c. 154.

c. 1340.—“They hoist upon these elephants as many chatras, or umbrellas of silk, mounted with many precious stones, and with handles of pure gold.”—Ibn Batuto, iii. 228.

c. 1354.—“But as all the Indians commonly go naked, they are in the habit of carrying a thing like a little tent-roof on a cane handle, which they open out at will as a protection against sun and rain. This they call a chatyr. I brought one home to Florence with me.…”—John Marignolli, in Cathay, &c. p. 381.

1673.—“Thus the chief Naik with his loud Musick…an Ensign of Red, Swallow- tailed, several Chitories, little but rich Kitsolls (which are the Names of several Countries for Umbrelloes).…”—Fryer, 160.

[1694.—“3 chatters.”—Hedges, Diary, Hak. Soc. ii. cclxv.

[1826.—“Another as my chitree- burdar or umbrella-carrier.”—Pandurang Hari, ed. 1873, i. 28.]

CHATTY, s. An earthen pot, spheroidal in shape. It is a S. Indian word, but is tolerably familiar in the Anglo-Indian parlance of N. India also, though the H. Ghurra (ghara) is more commonly used there. The word is Tam. shati, shatti, Tel. chatti, which appears in Pali as chadi.

1781.—“In honour of His Majesty’s birthday we had for dinner fowl cutlets and a flour pudding, and drank his health in a chatty of sherbet.”—Narr. of an Officer of Baillie’s Detachment, quoted in Lives of the Lindsays, iii. 285.

1829.—“The chatties in which the women carry water are globular earthen vessels, with a bell-mouth at top.”—Mem. of Col. Mountain, 97.

CHAW, s. For cha, i.e. Tea (q.v.).

1616.—“I sent…a silver chaw pot and a fan to Capt. China wife.”—Cocks’s Diary, i. 215.

CHAWBUCK, s. and v. A whip ; to whip. An obsolete vulgarism from P. chabuk, ‘alert’ ; in H. ‘a horsewhip.’ It seems to be the same as the sjambok in use at the Cape, and apparently carried from India (see the quotation from Van Twist). [Mr. Skeat points out that Klinkert gives chambok or sambok, as Javanese forms, the standard Malay being chabok or chabuk ; and this perhaps suggests that the word may have been introduced by Malay grooms once largely employed at the Cape.] 1648. “…Poor and little thieves are flogged with a great whip (called Siamback) several days in succession.”—Van Twist, 29.

1673.—“Upon any suspicion of default he has a Black Guard that by a Chawbuck, a great Whip, extorts Confession.”—Fryer, 98.

1673.—“The one was of an Armenian, Chawbucked through the City for selling of Wine.”—Ibid. 97.

1682.—“…Ramgivan, our Vekeel there (at Hugly) was sent for by Permesuradass, Bulchund’s servant, who immediately clapt him in prison. Ye same day was brought forth and slippered ; the next day he was beat on ye soles of his feet, ye third day Chawbuckt, and ye 4th drub’d till he could not speak, and all to force a writing in our names to pay Rupees 50,000 for custome of ye Silver brought