Chapter TELOOGOO to TERAI of T by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

from a citie called Tanasary, in the Kingdom of Pegu.”—C. Frederike, in Hakl. ii. 359. See Lancaster.

c. 1590.—“In Kambayat (Cambay) a Nákhuda (Nacoda) gets 800 R. … In Pegu and Dahnasari, he gets half as much again as in Cambay.”—Ain, i. 281.

[1598.—“Betweene two Islandes the coast runneth inwards like a bow, wherein lyeth the towne of Tanassarien.”—Linschoten, Hak. Soc. i. 103. In the same page he writes Tanassaria.

[1608.—“The small quantities they have here come from Tannaserye.”—Danvers, Letters, i. 22.

[c. 1610.—“Some Indians call it (Ceylon) Tenasirin, signifying land of delights, or earthly paradise.”—Pyrard de Laval, ii. 140, with Gray’s note (Hak. Soc.) quoted above.]

1727.—“Mr. Samuel White was made Shawbandaar (Shabunder) or Custom-Master at Merjee (Mergui) and Tanacerin, and Captain Williams was Admiral of the King’s Navy.”—A. Hamilton, ii. 64; [ed. 1744].

1783.—“Tannaserim. … ”—Forrest V. to Mergui, 4.

TERAI, TERYE, s. Hind. tarai, ‘moist (land)’ from tar, ‘moist’ or ‘green.’ [Others, however, connect it with tara, tala, ‘beneath (the Himalaya).’] The term is specially applied to a belt of marshy and j ungly land which runs along the foot of the Himalaya north of the Ganges, being that zone in which the moisture which has sunk into the talus of porous material exudes. A tract on the south side of the Ganges, now part of Bhagalpur, was also formerly known as the Jungle-terry (q.v.).

1793.—“Helloura, though standing very little below the level of Cheeria Ghat’s top is nevertheless comprehended in the Turry or Turryani of Nepaul … Turryani properly signifies low marshy lands, and is sometimes applied to the flats lying below the hills in the interior of Nepaul, as well as the low tract bordering immediately on the Company’s northern frontier.”—Kirkpatrick’s Nepaul (1811), p. 40.

1824.—“Mr. Boulderson said he was sorry to learn from the raja that he did not consider the unhealthy season of the Terrai yet over … I asked Mr. B. if it were true that the monkeys forsook these woods during the unwholesome months. He answered that not the monkeys only, but everything which had the breath of life instinctively deserts them from the beginning of April to October. The tigers go up to the hills, the antelopes and wild hogs make incursions into the cultivated plain … and not so much as a bird can be heard or seen in the frightful solitude.”—Heber, ed. 1844, 250–251.

[The word is used as an adj. to describe a severe form of malarial fever, and also a sort of double felt hat, worn when the sun is not so powerful as to require the use of a sola topee.

[1879.—“Remittent has been called Jungle Fever. Terai Fever, Bengal Fever, &c., from the locality in which it originated. … ”—Moore, Family Med. for India, 211.

[1880.—“A Terai hat is sufficient for a Collector.”—Ali Baba, 85.]