Chapter SOODRA to SOOSIE of S by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

for the former: a mistake not of recent occurrence only, as Sprengel says, ‘Distinguit vero Plinius marem a feminâ’ ” (Royle, on Ant. of Hindu Medicine, 100). [See Watt. Econ. Dict. i. 271.]

[1766.—“The powder is called by them surma; which they pretend refreshes and cools the eye, besides exciting its lustre, by the ambient blackness.”—Grose, 2nd ed. ii. 142.]

[1829.—“Soorma, or the oxide of antimony, is found on the western frontier.”—Tod, Annals, Calcutta reprint, i. 13.

[1832.—“Sulmah—A prepared permanent black dye, from antimony. …”—Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali, Observations, ii. 72.]

SOOSIE, s. Hind. from Pers. susi. Some kind of silk cloth, but we know not what kind. [Sir G. Birdwood (Industr. Arts, 246) defines susis as “fine-coloured cloths, made chiefly at Battala and Sialkote, striped in the direction of the warp with silk, or cotton lines of a different colour, the cloth being called dokanni [dokhani], ‘in two stripes’ if the stripe has two lines, if three, tinkanni [tinkhani], and so on.” In the Punjab it is ‘a striped stuff used for women’s trousers. This is made of fine thread, and is one of the fabrics in which English thread is now largely used’ (Francis, Mon. on Cotton Manufactures, 7). A silk fabric of the same name is made in the N.W.P., where it is classed as a variety of charkhana, or check (Yusuf Ali, Mon. on Silk, 93). Forbes Watson (Textile Manufactures, 85) speaks of Sousee as chiefly employed for trousering, being a mixture of cotton and silk. The word seems to derive its origin from Susa, the Biblical Shushan, the capital of Susiana or Elam, and from the time of Darius I. the chief residence of the Achaemenian kings. There is ample evidence to show that fabrics from Babylon were largely exported in early times. Such was perhaps the “Babylonish garment” found at Ai (Josh. vii. 21), which the R.V. marg. translates as a “mantle of Shinar”). This a writer in Smith’s Dict. of the Bible calls “robes trimmed with valuable furs, or the skins themselves ornamented with embroidery” (i. 452). These Babylonian fabrics have been often described (see Layard, Nineveh and Babylon, 537; Maspero, Dawn of Civ., 470, 758; Encycl. Bibl. ii. 1286 seq.; Frazer, Pausanias, iii. 545 seq.). An early reference to this old trade in costly cloths will be found in the quotation from the Periplus under CHINA, which has been discussed by Sir H. Yule (Introd. to Gill, River of Golden Sand, ed. 1883, p. 88 seq.). This Susi cloth appears in a log of 1746 as Soacie, and was known to the Portuguese in 1550 as Soajes (J. R. As. Soc., Jan. 1900, p. 158.)]

[1667.—“… 2 patch of ye finest with what colours you thinke handsome for my own wear Chockoles and susaes.”—In Yule, Hedges’ Diary, Hak. Soc. ii. cclxii.

[1690.—“It (Suratt) is renown’d … for Sooseys. …”—Ovington, 218.

[1714–20.—In an inventory of Sir J. Fellowes: “A Susa window-curtain.”—2nd ser. N. & Q. vi. 244.]

1784.—“Four cassimeers of different colours; Patna dimity, and striped Soosies.”—In Seton- Karr, i. 42.