Chapter SHINTOO to SHOE-FLOWER of S by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

SHINTOO to SHOE-FLOWER

SHINTOO, SINTOO, s. Japanese Shintau, ‘the Way of the Gods.’ The primitive relation of Japan. It is described by Faria y Sousa and other old writers, but the name does not apparently occur in those older accounts, unless it be in the Seuto of Couto. According to Kaempfer the philosophic or Confucian sect is called in Japan Siuto. But that hardly seems to fit what is said by Couto, and his Seuto seems more likely to be a mistake for Sento. [See Lowell’s articles on Esoteric Shintoo, in Proc. As. Soc. Japan, 1893.]

1612.—“But above all these idols they adore one Seutó, of which they say that it is the substance and principle of All, and that its abode is in the Heavens.”—Couto, V. viii. 12.

1727.—“Le Sinto qu’on appelle aussi Sinsju et Kamimitsi, est le Culte des Idoles, établi anciennement dans le pays. Sin et Kami sont les noms des Idoles qui font l’object de ce Culte. Siu (sic) signifie la Foi, ou la Religion. Sinsja et au pluriel Sinsju, ce sont les personnes qui professent cette Religion.”—Kaempfer, Hist. de Japon, i. 176; [E.T. 204].

1770.—“Far from encouraging that gloomy fanaticism and fear of the gods, which is inspired by almost all other religions, the Xinto sect had applied itself to prevent, or at least to moderate that disorder of the imagination.”—Raynal (E.T. 1777), i. 137.

1878.—“The indigenous religion of the Japanese people, called in later times by the name of Shintau or Way of the Gods, in order to distinguish it from the way of the Chinese moral philosophers, and the way of Buddha, had, at the time when Confucianism and Buddhism were introduced, passed through the earliest stages of development.”—Westminster Rev., N.S., No. cvii. 29.

[SHIRAZ, n.p. The wine of Shiraz was much imported and used by Europeans in India in the 17th century, and even later.

[1627.—“Sheraz then probably derives it self either from sherab which in the Persian Tongue signifies a Grape here abounding … or else from sheer which in the Persian signifies Milk.”—Sir. T. Herbert, ed. 1677, p. 127.

[1685.—“… three Chests of Sirash wine. …”—Pringle, Diary Ft. St. Geo., 1st ser. iv. 109, and see ii. 148.

[1690.—“Each Day there is prepar’d (at Surrat) a Publick Table for the Use of the President and the rest of the Factory. … The Table is spread with the choicest Meat Surrat affords … and equal plenty of generous Sherash and Arak Punch. …”—Ovington, 394.

[1727.—“Shyrash is a large City on the Road, about 550 Miles from Gombroon.”—A. Hamilton, ed. 1744, i. 99.

[1813.—“I have never tasted this (pomegranate wine), nor any other Persian wine, except that of Schiraz, which, although much extolled by poets, I think inferior to many wines in Europe.”—Forbes, Or. Mem. 2nd ed. i. 468.]

SHIREENBAF, s. Pers. Shirinbaf, ‘sweet-woof.’ A kind of fine cotton stuff, but we cannot say more precisely what.

c. 1343.—“… one hundred pieces o shirinbaf. …”—Ibn Batuta, iv. 3.

[1609.—“Serribaff, a fine light stuff or cotton whereof the Moors make their cabayes or clothing.”—Danvers, Letters, i. 29.]

1673.—“… siring chintz, Broad Baftas. …”—Fryer, 88.

SHISHAM. See under SISSOO.

SHISHMUHULL, s. Pers. shishamahal, lit. ‘glass apartment’ or palace. This is or was a common appendage of native palaces, viz. a hall or suite of rooms lined with mirror and other glittering surfaces, usually of a gimcrack aspect. There is a place of exactly the same description, now gone to hideous decay, in the absurd Villa Palagonia at Bagheria near Palermo.

1835.—“The Shisha-mahal, or house of glass, is both curious and elegant, although the material is principally pounded talc and looking-glass. It consists of two rooms, of which the walls in the interior are divided into a thousand different panels, each of which is filled up with raised flowers in silver, gold, and colours, on a ground-work of tiny convex mirrors.”—Wanderings of a Pilgrim, i. 365.

SHOE OF GOLD (or of Silver). The name for certain ingots of precious metal, somewhat in the form of a Chinese shoe, but more like a boat, which were formerly current in the trade of the Far East. Indeed of silver they are still current in China, for Giles says: “The common name among foreigners for the Chinese