Chapter CASH to CASHMERE of C by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

by W. J. Charlton, M. D.


An intermediate step in this transformation is found in Cocks’s Japan Journal, passim, e.g., ii. 89 : “But that which I tooke most note of was of the liberalitee and devotion of these heathen people, who thronged into the Pagod in multetudes one after another to cast money into a littel chapell before the idalles, most parte…being gins or brass money, whereof 100 of them may vallie som 10d. str., and are about the bignes of a 3d. English money.”

CASHEW, s. The tree, fruit, or nut of the Anacardium occidentale, an American tree which must have been introduced early into India by the Portuguese, for it was widely diffused apparently as a wild tree long before the end of the 17th century, and it is described as an Indian tree by Acosta, who wrote in 1578. Crawfurd also speaks of it as abundant, and in full bearing, in the jungly islets of Hastings Archipelago, off the coast of Camboja (Emb. to Siam, &c., i. 103) [see Teele’s note on Linschoten, Hak. Soc. ii. 27]. The name appears to be S. American, acajou, of which an Indian form, kaju, [and Malay gajus], have been made. The so-called fruit is the fleshy top of the peduncle which bears the nut. The oil in the shell of the nut is acrid to an extraordinary degree, whilst the kernels, which are roasted and eaten, are quite bland. The tree yields a gum imported under the name of Cadju gum.

1578.—“This tree gives a fruit called commonly Caiu ; which being a good stomachic, and of good flavour, is much esteemed by all who know it.…This fruit does not grow everywhere, but is found in gardens at the city of Santa Cruz in the Kingdom of Cochin.”—C. Acosta, Tractado, 324 seqq.

1598.—“Cajus groweth on trees like apple-trees, and are of the bignes of a Peare.”—Linschoten, p. 94 ; [Hak. Soc. ii. 28].

[1623.—P. della Valle, Hak. Soc. i. 135, calls it cagiu.]

1658.—In Piso, De Indiae utriusque Re Naturali et Medicâ, Amst., we have a good cut of the tree as one of Brasil, called Acaibaa “et fructus ejus Acaju.”

1672.—“…il Cagiu.…Questo è l’Amandola ordinaria dell’ India, per il che se ne raccoglie grandissima quantità, essendo la pianta fertilissima e molto frequente, ancora nelli luoghi più deserti et inculti.”—Vincenzo Maria, 354.

1673.—Fryer describes the tree under the name Cheruse (apparently some mistake), p. 182.

1764.— “…Yet if The Acajou haply in the garden bloom…”Grainger, iv.

[1813.—Forbes calls it “the chashew- apple,” and the “cajew-apple.”—Or. Mem. 2nd ed. i: 232, 238.]

c. 1830.—“The cashew, with its apple like that of the cities of the Plain, fair to look at, but acrid to the taste, to which the far-famed nut is appended like a bud.”— Tom Cringle, ed. 1863, p. 140.

1875.—“Cajoo kernels.”—Table of Customs Duties imposed in Br. India up to 1875.

CASHMERE, n.p. The famous valley province of the Western Himalaya, H. and P. Kashmir, from Skt. Kasmira, and sometimes Kasmira, alleged by Burnouf to be a contraction of Kasyapamira. [The name is more probably connected with the Khasa tribe.] Whether or not it be the Kaspatyrus or Kaspapyrus of Herodotus, we believe it undoubtedly to be the Kaspeiria (kingdom) of Ptolemy. Several of the old Arabian geographers write the name with the guttural k, but this is not so used in modern times.

c. 630.—“The Kingdom of Kia-shi-mi-lo (Kasmira) has about 7000 li of circuit. On all sides its frontiers are surrounded by mountains ; these are of prodigious height ; and although there are paths affording access to it, these are extremely narrow.”— Hwen T’sang (Pel. Bouddh.) ii. 167.

c. 940.—“Kashmir…is a mountainous country, forming a large kingdom, containing not less than 60,000 or 70,000 towns or villages. It is inaccessible except on one side, and can only be entered by one gate.” —Mas’udi, i. 373.

1275.—“Kashmir, a province of India, adjoining the Turks ; and its people of mixt Turk and Indian blood excel all others in beauty.”—Zakariya Kazvini, in Gildemeister, 210.

1298.—“Keshimur also is a province inhabited by a people who are idolaters and have a language of their own…this country is the very source from which idolatry has spread abroad.”—Marco Polo, i. 175.

1552.—“The Mogols hold especially towards the N.E. the region Sogdiana, which they now call Queximir, and also Mount Caucasus which divides India from the other Provinces.”—Barros, IV. vi. 1.

1615.—“Chishmeere, the chiefe Citie is called Sirinakar.”—Terry, in Purchas, ii. 1467 ; [so in Roe’s Map, vol. ii. Hak. Soc. ed. ; Chismer in Foster, Letters, iii. 283].

1664.—“From all that hath been said, one may easily conjecture, that I am somewhat charmed with Kachemire, and that I pretend there is nothing in the world like it for so small a kingdom.”—Bernier, E. T. 128 ; [ed. Constable, 400].

1676.—

“A trial of your kindness I must make;
Though not for mine, so much as virtue’s sake,
The Queen of Cassimere…”