Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymological, Historical, Geographical and Discursive

Every word in this dictionary has a secret life. Bungalow, pyjamas, tiffin, curry, mango, veranda, chintz, catamaran, cheroot, calico, ginghama whole vocabulary of everyday English that traveled from the heat and chaos of colonial India into your mouth without you ever asking where it came from. Sir Henry Yule and Arthur Coke Burnell spent years tracing these words back through centuries of contact, sifting through Portuguese, Dutch, French, and Arabic sources to show how English absorbed and transformed the languages it encountered. The term 'Hobson-Jobson' itself comes from the Islamic mourning cry 'Ya Hasan, ya Hosain,' twisted by English speakers into something unrecognizablea perfect metaphor for what happens to words when they cross oceans and empires. With over 2,000 entries, each one a small excavation into how cultures collide and merge, this 1886 masterpiece has never been superseded. It remains the definitive record of a linguistic romance that shaped the English language in ways most people never suspect. For anyone who has ever wondered why we call lunch 'tiffin' or where 'junk' came from, this book is an inexhaustible treasure.