Chapter FAN-PALM to FETISH of F by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

FAN-PALM to FETISH

FAN-PALM, s. The usual application of this name is to the Borassus flabelliformis, L. (see BRAB, PALMYRA), which is no doubt the type on which our ladies’ fans have been formed. But it is also sometimes applied to the Talipot (q.v.); and it is exceptionally (and surely erroneously) applied by Sir L. Pelly (J.R.G.S. xxxv. 232) to the “Traveller’s Tree,” i.e. the Madagascar Ravenala (Urania speciosa).

FANQUI, s. Chin. fan-kwei, ‘foreign demon’; sometimes with the affix tsz or tsû, ‘son’; the popular Chinese name for Europeans. [“During the 15th and 16th centuries large numbers of black slaves of both sexes from the E. I. Archipelago were purchased by the great houses of Canton to serve as gate-keepers. They were called ‘devil slaves,’ and it is not improbable that the term ‘foreign devil,’ so freely used by the Chinese for foreigners, may have had this origin.”—Ball, Things Chinese, 535.]

FARÁSH, FERÁSH, FRASH, s. Ar.—H. farrash, [farsh, ‘to spread (a carpet’)]. A menial servant whose proper business is to spread carpets, pitch tents, &c., and, in fact, in a house, to do housemaid’s work; employed also in Persia to administer the bastinado. The word was in more common use in India two centuries ago than now. One of the highest hereditary officers of Sindhia’s Court is called the Farash- khana-wala. [The same word used for the tamarisk tree (Tamarix gallica) is a corr. of the Ar. faras.]

c. 1300.—“Sa grande richesce apparut en un paveillon que li roys d’Ermenie envoia au roy de France, qui valoit bien cinq cens livres; et li manda li roy de Hermenie que uns ferrais au Soudanc dou Coyne li avoit donnei. Ferrais est cil qui tient les paveillons au Soudanc et qui li nettoie ses mesons.”—Jehan, Seigneur de Joinville, ed. De Wailly, p. 78.

c. 1513.—“And the gentlemen rode … upon horses from the king’s stables, attended by his servants whom they call farazes, who groom and feed them.”—Correa, Lendas, II. i. 364.

(Here it seems to be used for Syce (q.v.) or groom).

[1548.—“Ffarazes.” See under BATTA, a.]

c. 1590.—“Besides, there are employed 1000 Farráshes, natives of Irán, Turán, and Hindostán.”—Ain, i. 47.

1648.—“The Frassy for the Tents.”— Van Twist, 86.

1673.—“Where live the Frasses or Porters also.”—Fryer, 67.

1764.—(Allowances to the Resident at Murshidabad).

“Public servants as follows:—1 Vakeel, 2 Moonshees, 4 Chobdars, 2 Jemadars, 20 Peons, 10Mussalchees, 12 Bearers, 2 Chowry Bearers, and such a number of Frosts and Lascars as he may have occasion for removing his tents.”—In Long, 406.

[1812.—“Much of course depends upon the chief of the Feroshes or tent-pitchers, called the Ferosh-Bashee, who must necessarily be very active.”—Morier, Journey through Persia, 70.]

1824.—“Call the ferashes … and let them beat the rogues on the soles of their feet, till they produce the fifty ducats.”— Hajji Baba (ed. 1835), 40.

[1859.—

“The Sultan rises and the dark Ferrash
Strikes and prepares it for another guest.”

FitzGerald, Omar Khayyam, xlv.]

FEDEA, FUDDEA, s. A denomination of money formerly current in Bombay and the adjoining coast; Mahr. p’hadya (qu. Ar. fidya, ransom ?). It constantly occurs in the account statements of the 16th century, e.g. of Nunez (1554) as a money of account, of which 4 went to the silver tanga, [see TANGA] 20 to the Pardao. In Milburn (1813) it is a pice or copper coin, of which 50 went to a rupee. Prof. Robertson Smith suggests that this may be the Ar. denomination of a small coin used in Egypt, fadda (i.e. ‘silverling’). It may be an objection that the letter zwad used in that word is generally pronounced in India as a z. The fadda is the Turkish para, 1/40 of a piastre, an infinitesimal value now. [Burton (Arabian Nights, xi. 98) gives 2000 faddahs as equal about 1s. 2d.] But, according to Lane, the name was originally given to half-dirhems, coined early in the 15th century, and these would be worth about 5 2/3d. The fedea of 1554 would be about 4 1/4d. This rather indicates the identity of the names.

FERÁZEE, s Properly Ar. faraizi, from faraiz (pl. of farz) ‘the divine ordinances.’ A name applied to a body of Mahommedan Puritans in Bengal, kindred to the Wahabis of Arabia. They represent a reaction and protest against the corrupt condition and pagan practices into which Mahommedanism in Eastern India had fallen, analogous to the former decay of native Christianity in the south (see MALABAR RITES). T his reaction was begun by Hajji Sh