Chapter GODDESS to GOGO of G by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

GODDESS to GOGO

GODDESS, s. An absurd corruption which used to be applied by our countrymen in the old settlements in the Malay countries to the young women of the land. It is Malay gadis, ‘a virgin.’

c. 1772.—

“And then how strange, at night opprest
By toils, with songs you’re lulled to rest;
Of rural goddesses the guest, Delightful!”

W. Marsden, in Memoirs, 14.

1784.—“A lad at one of these entertainments, asked another his opinion of a gaddees who was then dancing. ‘If she were plated with gold, replied he, ‘I would not take her for my concubine, much less for my wife.’ ”—Marsden’s H. of Sumatra, 2nd ed., 230.

GODOWN, s. A warehouse for goods and stores; an outbuilding used for stores; a store-room. The word is in constant use in the Chinese ports as well as in India. The H. and Beng. gudam is apparently an adoption of the Anglo-Indian word, not its original. The word appears to have passed to the continent of India from the eastern settlements, where the Malay word gadong is used in the same sense of ‘store- room,’ but also in that of ‘a house built of brick or stone.’ Still the word appears to have come primarily from the South of India, where in Telugu gidangi, giddangi, in Tamil kidangu, signify ‘a place where goods lie,’ from kidu, ‘to lie.’ It appears in Singhalese also as gudama. It is a fact that many common Malay and Javanese words are Tamil, or only to be explained by Tamil. Free intercourse between the Coromandel Coast and the Archipelago is very ancient, and when the Portuguese first appeared at Malacca they found there numerous settlers from S. India (see s.v. KLING). Bluteau gives the word as palavra da India, and explains it as a “logea quasi debai xo de chao” (“almost under ground”), but this is seldom the case. [1513.—“…in which all his rice and a Gudam full of mace was burned.”—Letter of F. P. Andrade to Albuquerque, Feb. 22, India Office, MSS. Corpo Chronologico, vol. I.

[1552.—“At night secretly they cleared their Gudams, which are rooms almost under ground, for fear of fire.”—Barros, Dec. II. Bk. vi. ch. 3.]

1552.—“…and ordered them to plunder many godowns (gudoes) in which there was such abundance of clove, nutmeg, mace, and sandal wood, that our people could not transport it all till they had called in the people of Malacca to complete its removal.”—Castanheda, iii. 276-7.

1561.—“…Godowns (Gudões), which are strong houses of stone, having the lower part built with lime.”—Correa, II. i. 236. (The last two quotations refer to events in 1511.)

1570.—“…but the merchants have all one house or Magazon, which house they call Godon, which is made of brickes.”—Caesar Frederike, in Hakl.

1585.—“In the Palace of the King (at Pegu) are many magazines both of gold and of silver.…Sandalwood, and lign-aloes, and all such things, have their gottons (gottoni), which is as much as to say separate chambers.”—Gasparo Balbi, f. 111.

[c. 1612.—“…if I did not he would take away from me the key of the gadong.”—Danvers, Letters, i. 195.]

1613.—“As fortelezas e fortificaçaões de Malayos ordinariamente erão aedifficios de matte entaypado, de que havia muytas casas e armenyas ou godoens que são aedifficios sobterraneos, em que os mercadores recolhem as roupas de Choromandel per il perigo de fogo.”—Godinho de Eredia, 22.

1615.—“We paid Jno. Dono 70 taies or plate of bars in full payment of the fee symple of the gadonge over the way, to westward of English howse, whereof 100 taies was paid before.”—Cocks’s Diary, i. 39; [in i. 15 gedonge].

[„ “An old ruined brick house or godung.”—Foster, Letters, iii. 109.

[„ “The same goods to be locked up in the gaddones.”—Ibid. iii. 159.]

1634.—

“Virão das ruas as secretas minas
Das abrazadas casas as ruinas,
E das riquezas os gudões desertos.”

Malacca Conquistada, x. 61.

1680.—“Rent Rowle of Dwelling Houses, Goedowns, etc., within the Garrison in Christian Town.”—In Wheeler, i. 253-4.

1683.—“I went to ye Bankshall to mark out and appoint a Plat of ground to build a Godown for ye Honble. Company’s Salt Petre.”—Hedges, Diary, March 5; [Hak. Soc. i. 67].

1696.—“Monday, 3rd August. The Choultry Justices having produced examinations taken by them concerning the murder of a child in the Black town, and the robbing of a godown within the walls:—it is ordered