Chapter TALISMAN to TAMARIND of T by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

TALLICA, s. Hind. from Ar ta’-likah. An invoice or schedule.

1682.—“…that he…would send another Droga (Daroga) or Customer on purpose to take our Tallicas.”—Hedges, Diary, Dec. 26; [Hak. Soc. i. 60. Also see under KUZZANNA].

TALOOK, s. This word, Ar. ta’alluk, from root ’alak, ‘to hang or depend,’ has various shades of meaning in different parts of India. In S. and W. India it is the subdivision of a district, presided over as regards revenue matters by a tahseeldar. In Bengal it is applied to tracts of proprietary land, sometimes not easily distinguished from Zemindaries, and sometimes subordinate to or dependent on Zemindars. In the N.W. Prov. and Oudh the ta’alluk is an estate the profits of which are divided between different proprietors, one being superior, the other inferior (see TALOOKDAR). Ta’alluk is also used in Hind. for ‘department’ of administration. 1885.—“In October, 1779, the Dacca Council were greatly disturbed in their minds by the appearance amongst them of John Doe, who was then still in his prime. One Chundermonee demised to John Doe and his assigns certain lands in the pergunna Bullera…whereupon George III., by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, and so forth, commanded the Sheriff of Calcutta to give John Doe possession. At this Mr. Shakspeare burst into fury, and in language which must have surprised John Doe, proposed ‘that a sezawul be appointed for the collection of Patparrah Talook, with directions to pay the same into Bullera cutcherry.’ ”—Sir J. Stephen, Nuncomar and Impey, ii. 159–60. A sazãwal is “an officer specially appointed to collect the revenue of an estate, from the management of which the owner or farmer has been removed.”—(Wilson).

TALOOKDAR, s. Hind. from Pers. ta’allukdar, ‘the holder of a ta’alluk’ (see TALOOK) in either of the senses of that word; i.e. either a Government officer collecting the revenue of a ta’alluk (though in this sense it is probably now obsolete everywhere), or the holder of an estate so designated. The famous Talookdars of Oudh are large landowners, possessing both villages of which they are sole proprietors, and other villages, in which there are subordinate holders, in which the Talookdar is only the superior proprietor (see Carnegie, Kachari Technicalities).

[1769.—“…inticements are frequently employed by the Talookdars to augment the concourse to their lands.”—Verelst, View of Bengal, App. 233. In his Glossary he defines “Talookdar, the Zemeen-dar of a small district.”]

TAMARIND, s. The pod of the tree which takes its name from that product, Tamarindus indica, L., N.O. Leguminosae. It is a tree cultivated throughout India and Burma for the sake of the acid pulp of the pod, which is laxative and cooling, forming a most refreshing drink in fever. The tree is not believed by Dr. Brandis to be indigenous in India, but is supposed to be so in tropical Africa. The origin of the name is curious. It is Ar. tamar-u’l-Hind, ‘date of India,’ or perhaps rather in Persian form, tamar-i-Hindi. It is possible that the original name may have been thamar, ‘fruit’ of India, rather than tamar, ‘date.’ 1298.—“When they have taken a merchant vessel, they force the merchants to swallow a stuff called Tamarindi, mixed in sea-water, which produces a violent purging.”—Marco Polo, 2nd ed., ii. 383.

c. 1335.—“L’arbre appelé hammar, c’est à dire al-tamar-al-Hindi, est un arbre sauvage qui couvre les montagnes.”—Masalik- al-absur, in Not. et Ext. xiii. 175.

1563.—“It is called in Malavar puli, and in Guzerat ambili, and this is the name they have among all the other people of this India; and the Arab calls it tamarindi, because tamar, as you well know, is our tamara, or, as the Castilians say, datil [i.e. date], so that tamarindi are ‘dates of India’; and this was because the Arabs could not think of a name more appropriate on account of its having stones inside, and not because either the tree or the fruit had any resemblance.”—Garcia, f. 200. [Puli is the Malayal. name; ambilii is probably Hind. imli, Skt. amlika, ‘the tamarind.’]

c. 1580.—“In febribus verò pestilentibus, atque omnibus aliis ex putridis, exurentibus, aquam, in qua multa copia Tamarindorum infusa fuerit cum saccharo ebibunt.”—Prosper Alpinus (De Plantis Aegypt.) ed. Lugd. Bat. 1735, ii. 20.

1582.—“They have a great store of Tamarindos.…”—Castañeda, by N.L. f. 94.

[1598.—“Tamarinde is by the Aegyptians called Derelside (qu. dar-al-sayyida, ‘Our Lady’s tree’?).”—Linschoten, Hak. Soc. ii. 121.]

1611.—“That wood which we cut for firewood did all hang trased with cods of greene fruit (as big as a Bean-cod in England) called Tamerim; it hath a very soure tast, and by the Apothecaries is held good against the Scurvie.”—N. Dounton, in Purchas, i. 277.

[1623.—“Tamarinds, which the Indians call Hambele” (imli, as in quotation from Garcia above).—P. della Valle, Hak. Soc. i. 92.]

1829.—“A