Chapter DRAWERS to DUBBER of D by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

DRAWERS to DUBBER

DRAWERS, LONG, s. An old-fashioned term, probably obsolete except in Madras, equivalent to pyjamas (q.v.).

1794.—“The contractor shall engage to supply…every patient…with…a clean gown, cap, shirt, and long drawers.”—In Seton-Karr, ii. 115.

DRESSING-BOY, DRESS-BOY, s. Madras term for the servant who acts as valet, corresponding to the bearer (q.v.) of N. India. 1837.—See Letters from Madras, 106.

DRUGGERMAN, s. Neither this word for an ‘interpreter,’ nor the Levantine dragoman, of which it was a quaint old English corruption, is used in Anglo-Indian colloquial; nor is the Arab tarjuman, which is the correct form, a word usual in Hindustani. But the character of the two former words seems to entitle them not to be passed over in this Glossary. The Arabic is a loan-word from Aramaic targeman, metargeman, ‘an interpreter’; the Jewish Targums, or Chaldee paraphrases of the Scriptures, being named from the same root. The original force of the Aramaic root is seen in the Assyrian ragamu, ‘to speak,’ rigmu, ‘the word.’ See Proc. Soc. Bibl. Arch., 1883, p. 73, and Delitsch, The Hebrew Lang. viewed in the Light of Assyrian Research, p. 50. In old Italian we find a form somewhat nearer to the Arabic. (See quotation from Pegolotti below.)

c. 1150?.—“Quorum lingua cum praenominato Iohanni, Indorum patriarchae, nimis esset obscura, quod neque ipse quod Romani dicerent, neque Romani quod ipse diceret intelligerent, interprete interposito, quem Achivi drogomanum vocant, de mutuo statu Romanorum et Indicae regionis ad invicem querere coeperunt.”—De Adventu Patriarchae Indorum, printed in Zarncke, Der Priester Johannes, i. 12. Leipzig, 1879.

[1252.—“Quia meus Turgemanus non erat sufficiens.”—W. de Rubruk, p. 154.]

c. 1270.—“After this my address to the assembly, I sent my message to Elx by a dragoman (trujaman) of mine.”—Chron. of James of Aragon, tr. by Foster, ii. 538.

Villehardouin, early in the 13th century, uses drughement, [and for other early forms see N.E.D. s.v. Dragoman.]

c. 1309.—“Il avoit gens illec qui savoient le Sarrazinnois et le françois que l’on apelle drugemens, qui enromancoient le Sarrazinnois au Conte Perron.”—Joinville, ed. de Wailly, 182.

c. 1343.—“And at Tana you should furnish yourself with dragomans (turcimanni).”—Pegolotti’s Handbook, in Cathay, &c., ii. 291, and App. iii.

1404.—“…el maestro en Theologia dixo por su Truximan que dixesse al Señor q aquella carta que su fijo el rey le embiara non la sabia otro leer, salvo el….”—Clavijo, 446.

1585.—“…e dopo m’esservi prouisto di vn buonissimo dragomano, et interprete, fu inteso il suono delle trombette le quali annuntiauano l’udienza del Rè” (di Pegu).—Gasparo Balbi, f. 102v.

1613.—“To the Trojan Shoare, where I landed Feb. 22 with fourteene English men more, and a Iew or Druggerman.”—T. Coryat, in Purchas, ii. 1813.

1615.—“E dietro, a cavallo, i dragomanni, cioè interpreti della repubblica e con loro tutti i dragomanni degli altri ambasciatori ai loro luoghi.”—P. della Valle, i. 89.

1738.—

“Till I cried out, you prove yourself so able,
Pity! you was not Druggerman at Babel!
For had they found a linguist half so good,
I make no question that the Tower had stood.”—Pope, after Donne, Sat. iv. 81.

Other forms of the word are (from Span. trujaman) the old French truchement, Low Latin drocmandus, turchimannus, Low Greek [Greek Text] dragoumanoV, &c.

DRUMSTICK, s. The colloquial name in the Madras Presideny for the long slender pods of the Moringa pterygosperma, Gaertner, the Horse-Radish Tree (q.v.) of Bengal.

c. 1790.—“Mon domestique étoit occupé à me préparer un plat de morungas, qui sont une espèce de fèves longues, auxquelles les Européens ont donné, à cause de leur forme, le nom de baguettes à tambour…”—Haafner, ii. 25.

DUB, s. Telugu dabbu, Tam. idappu; a small copper coin, the same as the doody (see CASH), value 20 cash; whence it comes to stand for money in general. It is curious that we have also an English provincial word, “Dubs=money, E. Sussex” (Holloway, Gen. Dict. of Provincialisms, Lewes, 1838). And the slang ‘to dub up,’ for to pay up, is common (see Slang Dict.). 1781.—“In “Table of Prison Expenses and articles of luxury only to be attained by the opulent, after a length of saving” (i.e. in captivity in Mysore),