1615.—"The inhabitants (of Sidon) are of sundry nations and religions; governed by a succession of Princes whom they call Emers; descended, as they say, from the Druses."—Sandys, Iourney, 210.
AMOY, n.p. A great seaport of Fokien in China, the name of which in Mandarin dialect is Hia-men, meaning 'Hall Gate,' which is in the Changchau dialect A-muin. In some books of the last century it is called Emwy and the like. It is now a Treaty-Port.
1687.—"Amoy or Anhay, which is a city standing on a Navigable River in the Province of Fokien in China, and is a place of vast trade."—Dampier, i. 417. (This looks as if Dampier confounded the name of Amoy, the origin of which (as generally given) we have stated, with that of An-hai, one of the connected ports, which lies to the N.E., about 30 m., as the crow flies, from Amoy).
1727.—"There are some curiosities in Amoy. One is a large Stone that weighs above forty Tuns ... in such an Equilibrium, that a Youth of twelve Years old can easily make it move."—A. Hamilton, ii. 243.
AMSHOM, s. Malayāl. am̃śam, from Skt. āmśah, 'a part,' defined by Gundert as "part of a Talook, formerly called hobili, greater than a taṛa." [Logan (Man. Malabar, i. 87) speaks of the amsam as a 'parish.'] It is further explained in the following quotation:—
1878.—"The amshom is really the smallest revenue division there is in Malabar, and is generally a tract of country some square miles in extent, in which there is no such thing as a village, but a series of scattered homesteads and farms, where the owner of the land and his servants reside ... separate and apart, in single separate huts, or in scattered collections of huts."—Report of Census Com. in India.
A MUCK, to run, v. There is we believe no room for doubt that, to us at least, this expression came from the Malay countries, where both the phrase and the practice are still familiar. Some valuable remarks on the phenomenon, as prevalent among the Malays, were contributed by Dr Oxley of Singapore to the Journal of the Indian Archipelago, vol. iii. p. 532; see a quotation below. [Mr W. W. Skeat writes—"The best explanation of the fact is perhaps that it was the Malay national method of committing suicide, especially as one never hears of Malays committing suicide in any other way. This form of suicide may arise from a wish to die fighting and thus avoid a 'straw death, a cow's death'; but it is curious that women and children are often among the victims, and especially members of the suicide's own family. The act of running amuck is probably due to causes over which the culprit has some amount of control, as the custom has now died out in the British Possessions in the Peninsula, the offenders probably objecting to being caught and tried in cold blood. I remember hearing of only about two cases (one by a Sikh soldier) in about six years. It has been suggested further that the extreme monotonous heat of the Peninsula may have conduced to such outbreaks as those of Running amuck and Latah.]
The word is by Crawfurd ascribed to the Javanese, and this is his explanation:
"Amuk (J.). An a-muck; to run a-muck; to tilt; to run furiously and desperately at any one; to make a furious onset or charge in combat."—(Malay Dict.) [The standard Malay, according to Mr Skeat, is rather amok (mengāmok).]
Marsden says that the word rarely occurs in any other than the verbal form mengāmuk, 'to make a furious attack' (Mem. of a Malayan Family, 96).