Chapter ALPEEN to A MUCK of A by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

AMEER, s. Ar. Amir (root amr,‘commanding,’ and so) ‘a commander, chief, or lord,’ and, in Ar.application, any kind of chief from the Amiru’ Imuminin, ‘the Amir of the Faithful’ i.e. the Caliph, downwards. The word in this form perhap s first became familiar as applied to the Princes of Sind, at the time of the conquest of that Province by Sir C. J. Napier. It is the title affected by many Musulman sovereigns of various calibres, as the Amir of Kabul, the Amir of Bokhara, &c. But in sundry other forms the word has, more or less, taken root in European languages since the early Middle Ages. Thus it is the origin of the title ‘Admiral,’ now confined to generals of the sea service, but applied in varying forms by medieval Christian writers to the Amirs, or lords, of the court and army of Egypt and other Mohammedan States. The word also came to us again, by a later importation from the Levant, in the French form, Emir or Emer.—See also Omrah, which is in fact Umara, the pl. of Amir. Byzantine writers use ’AmÎr, ’Amhras, ’Amuras, ’Amhraios, &c. (See Ducange, Gloss. Grœcit.) It is the opinion of the best scholars that the forms Amiral, Ammiraglio, Admiral &c., originated in the application of a Low Latin termination -alis or -alius, though some doubt may still attach to this question. (See Marcel Devic, s.v. Amiral, and Dozy, Oosterlingen, s.v. Admiraal [and N.E.D. s.v. Admiral]. The d in admiral probably came from a false imagination of connection with admirari.

1250.—“Li grand amiraus des galies m’envoia querre, et me demanda si j’estoie cousins le roy; et je le di que nanin.…”—Joinville, p. 178. This passage illustrates the sort of way in which our modern use of the word admiral originated.

c. 1345.—“The Master of the Ship is like a great amir; when he goes ashore the archers and the blackamoors march before him with javelins and swords, with drums and horns and trumpets.”—Ibn Batuta, iv. 93.

Compare with this description of the Commander of a Chinese Junk in the 14th century, A. Hamilton’s of an English Captain in Malabar in the end of the 17th:

“Captain Beawes, who commanded the Albemarle, accompanied us also, carrying a Drum and two Trumpets with us, so as to make our Compliment the more solemn.”—i. 294.

And this again of an “interloper” skipper at Hooghly, in 1683:

1683.—“Alley went in a splendid Equipage, habitted in scarlet richly laced. Ten Englishmen in Blue Capps and Coats edged with Red, all armed with Blunderbusses, went before his pallankeen, 80 (? 8) Peons before them, and 4 Musicians playing on the Weights with 2 Flaggs, before him, like an Agent …”—Hedges, Oct. 8 (Hak. Soc. i. 123).

1384.—“Il Soldano fu cristiano di Grecia, e fu venduto per schiavo quando era fanciullo a uno ammiraglio, come tu dicessi ‘capitano di guerra.’ ”—Frescobaldi, p. 39.

[1510.—See quotation from Varthema under XERAFINE.]

1615.—“The inhabitants (of Sidon) are of sundry nations and religions; governed by a succession of Princes whom they call Emers; descended, as they say, from the Druses.”—Sandys, Iourney, 210.

AMOY, n.p. A great seaport of Fokien in China, the name of which in Mandarin dialect is Hia-men, meaning ‘Hall Gate,’ which is in the Changchau dialect A-muiⁿ. In some books of the last century it is called Emwy and the like. It is now a Treaty-Port.

1687.—“Amoy or Anhay, which is a city standing on a Navigable River in the Province of Fokien in China, and is a place of vast trade.”—Dampier, i. 417. (This looks as if Dampier confounded the name of Amoy, the origin of which (as generally given) we have stated, with that of An-hai, one of the connected ports, which lies to the N.E., about 30 m., as the crow flies, from Amoy).

1727.—“There are some curiosities in Amoy. One is a large Stone that weighs above forty Tuns.… in such an Equilibrium, that a Youth of twelve Years old can easily make it move.”—A. Hamilton, ii. 243.

AMSHOM, s. Malayal. amam, from Skt. amah, ‘a part,’ defined by Gundert as “part of a Talook, formerly called hobili, greater than a tara.” [Logan (Man. Malabar, i. 87) speaks of the amsam as a ‘parish.’] It is further explained in the following quotation:—

1878.—“The amshom is really the smallest revenue division there is in Malabar, and is generally a tract of country some square miles in extent, in which there is no such thing as a village, but a series of scattered homesteads and farms, where the owner of the land and his servants reside.… separate and apart, in single separate huts, or in scattered collections of huts.”—Report of Census Com. in India.