Chapter CALUAT to CAMBOJA of C by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

in decay, owing partly to the shoals, and the extraordinary rise and fall of the tides in the Gulf, impeding navigation. [See Forbes, Or. Mem. 2nd ed. i. 313 seqq.].

c. 951.—“ From Kambáya to the sea about 2 parasangs. From Kambáya to Súrabáya (?) about 4 days.”—Istakhri, in Elliot, i. 30.

1298.—“ Cambaet is a great kingdom.…There is a great deal of trade.…Merchants come here with many ships and cargoes.…”—Marco Polo, Bk. iii. ch. 28.

1320.—“ Hoc vero Oceanum mare in illis partibus principaliter habet duos portus: quorum vnus nominatur Mahabar, et alius Cambeath.”—Marino Sanudo, near beginning.

c. 1420.—“ Cambay is situated near to the sea, and is 12 miles in circuit; it abounds in spikenard, lac, indigo, myrabolans, and silk.”—Conti, in India in XVth Cent., 20.

1498.—“ In which Gulf, as we were informed, there are many cities of Christians and Moors, and a city which is called Quambaya.”— Roteiro. 49.

1506.—“ In Combea è terra de Mori, e il suo Re è Moro; el è una gran terra, e li nasce turbiti, e spigonardo, e milo (read nilo— see ANIL), lache, corniole, calcedonie, gotoni.…”—Rel. di Leonardo Ca’ Masser, in Archivio Stor. Italiano, App.

1674.—

“The Prince of Cambay’s daily food
Is asp and basilisk and toad,
Which makes him have so strong a breath,
Each night he stinks a queen to death.”

Hudibras, Pt. ii. Canto i.

Butler had evidently read the sto ries of Mahmud Bigara, Sultan of Guzerat, in Varthema or Purchas.

CAMBOJA, n.p. An ancient kingdom in the eastern part of Indo-China, once great and powerful: now fallen, and under the ‘protectorate’ of France, whose Saigon colony it adjoins. The name, like so many others of Indo-China since the days of Ptolemy, is of Skt, origin, being apparently a transfer of the name of a nation and country on the N. W. frontier of India, Kamboja, supposed to have been about the locality of Chitral or Kafiristan. Ignoring this, fantastic Chinese and other etymologies have been invented for the name. In the older Chinese annals (c. 1200 B.C.) this region had the name of Fu-nan; from the period after our era, when the kingdom of Camboja had become powerful, it was known to the Chinese as Chin-la. Its power seems to have extended at one time westward, perhaps to the shores of the B. of Bengal. Ruins of extraordinary vastness and architectural elaboration are numerous, and have attracted great attention since M. Mouhot’s visit in 1859; though they had been mentioned by 16th century missionaries, and some of the buildings when standing in splendour were described by a Chinese visitor at the end of the 13th century. The Cambojans proper call themselves Khmer, a name which seems to have given rise to singular confusions (see COMAR). The gum Gamboge (Cambodiam in the early records [Birdwood, Rep. on Old Rec., 27]) so familiar in use, derives its name from this country, the chief source of supply.

c. 1161.—“…although…because the belief of the people of Rámánya (Pegu) was the same as that of the Buddha-believing men of Ceylon.…Parakrama the king was living in peace with the king of Rámánya—yet the ruler of Rámánya…forsook the old custom of providing maintenance for the ambassadors…saying: ‘These messengers are sent to go to Kámboja,’ and so plundered all their goods and put them in prison in the Malaya country.…Soon after this he seized some royal virgins sent by the King of Ceylon to the King of Kámboja…”— Ext from Ceylonese Annals, by T. Rhys Davids, in J.A.S.B. xli. Pt. i. p. 198.

1295.—“Le pays de Tchin-la…Les gens du pays le nomment Kan-phou-tchi. Sous la dynastie actuelle, les livres sacrés des Tibétains nomment ce pays Kan-phoutchi. …”—Chinese Account of Chinla, in Abel Rémusat, Nouv. Mél. i. 100.

c. 1535.—“Passing from Siam towards China by the coast we find the kingdom of Cambaia (read Camboia)…the people are great warriors…and the country of Camboia abounds in all sorts of victuals…in this land the lords voluntarily burn themselves when the king dies.…”—Sommario de’ Regni, in Ramusio, i. f. 336.

1552.—“And the next State adjoining Siam is the kingdom of Camboja, through the middle of which flows that splendid river the Mecon, the source of which is in the regions of China.…”—Barros, Dec. I. Liv. ix. cap. 1.

1572.—

“Vês, passa por Camboja Mecom rio,,
Que capitão das aguas se interpreta.…”

Camões, x. 127.

[1616.—“22 cattes camboja (gamboge).” —Foster, Letters, iv. 188.]