Chapter PUNJAUB to PUNKAH of P by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

make wind for cooling, which they call cattaventos.”—Literal Transln. from Linschoten, ch. 6.

1598.—“And they vse certaine instruments like Waggins, with bellowes, to beare all the people in, and to gather winde to coole themselves withall, which they call Cattaventos.”—Old English Translation, by W. P., p. 16; [Hak. Soc. i. 52].

The French version is really a brief description of the punka:

1610.—“Ils ont aussi du Cattaventos qui sont certains instruments pendus en l’air es quels se faisant donner le bransle ils font du vent qui les rafraichit.”—Ed. 1638, p. 17.


The next also perhaps refers to a suspended punka: 1662.—“…furnished also with good Cellars with great Flaps to stir the Air, for reposing in the fresh Air from 12 till 4 or 5 of the Clock, when the Air of these Cellars begins to be hot and stuffing.”—Bernier, p. 79; [ed. Constable, 247].

1807.—“As one small concern succeeds another, the punkah vibrates gently over my eyes.”—Lord Minto in India, 27.

1810.—“Were it not for the punka (a large frame of wood covered with cloth) which is suspended over every table, and kept swinging, in order to freshen the air, it would be scarcely possible to sit out the melancholy ceremony of an Indian dinner.”—Maria Graham, 30.

” Williamson mentions that punkahs “were suspended in most dining halls.”—Vade Mecum, i. 281.

1823.—“Punkas, large frames of light wood covered with white cotton, and looking not unlike enormous fire-boards, hung from the ceilings of the principal apartments.”—Heber, ed. 1844, i. 28.

1852.—

“Holy stones with scrubs and slaps
(Our Christmas waits!) prelude the day;
For holly and festoons of bay
Swing feeble punkas,—or perhaps
A windsail dangles in collapse.”

Christmas on board a P. and O., near the Equator.

1875.—“The punkah flapped to and fro lazily overhead.”—Chesney, The Dilemma, ch. xxxviii.


Mr. Busteed observes: “It is curious that in none of the lists of servants and their duties which are scattered through the old records in the last century (18th), is there any mention of the punka, nor in any narratives referring to domestic life in India then, that have come under our notice, do we remember any allusion to its use…. The swinging punka, as we see it to-day, was, as every one knows, an innovation of a later period…. This dates from an early year in the present century.”—Echoes of Old Calcutta, p. 115. He does not seem, however, to have found any positive evidence of the date of its introduction. [“Hanging punkahs are said by one authority to have originated in Calcutta by accident towards the close of the last (18th) century. It is reported that a clerk in a Government office suspended the leaf of a table, which was accidentally waved to and fro by a visitor. A breath of cool air followed the movement, and suggested the idea which was worked out and resulted in the present machine” (Carey, Good Old Days of John Company, i. 81). Mr. Douglas says that punkahs were little used by Europeans in Bombay till 1810. They were not in use at Nuncomar’s trial in Calcutta (1775), Bombay and W. India, ii. 253.]

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