TURNEE, TUNNEE, s. An English supercargo, Sea-Hind., and probably a corruption of attorney. (Roebuck).
TURPAUL, s. Sea-Hind. A tarpaulin (ibid.). [The word (tārpāl) has now come into common native use.]
TUSSAH, TUSSER, s. A kind of inferior silk, the tissues of which are now commonly exported to England. Anglo-Indians generally regard the termination of this word in r as a vulgarism, like the use of solar for [sola] (q.v.); but it is in fact correct. For though it is written by Milburn (1813) tusha, and tusseh (ii. 158, 244), we find it in the Āīn-i-Akbarī as tassar, and in Dr. Buchanan as tasar (see below). The term is supposed to be adopted from Skt. tasara, trasara, Hind. tasar, 'a shuttle'; perhaps from the form of the cocoon? The moth whose worm produced this silk is generally identified with Antheraea paphia, but Capt. Hutton has shown that there are several species known as tasar worms. These are found almost throughout the whole extent of the forest tracts of India. But the chief seat of the manufacture of stuffs, wholly or partly of tasar silk, has long been Bhāgalpur on the Ganges. [See also Allen, Mon. on Silk Cloths of Assam, 1899; Yusuf Ali, Silk Fabrics of N.W.P., 1900.] The first mention of tasar in English reports is said to be that by Michael Atkinson of Jangīpūr, as cited below in the Linnæan Transactions of 1804 by Dr. Roxburgh (see Official Report on Sericulture in India, by J. Geoghegan, Calcutta, 1872), [and the elaborate article in Watt, Econ. Dict. vi. pt. iii. 96 seqq.].
c. 1590.—"Tassar, per piece ... ⅓ to 2 Rupees."—Āīn, i. 94.
[1591.—See the account by Rumphius, quoted by Watt, loc. cit. p. 99.]
1726.—"Tessersse ... 11 ells long and 2 els broad...."—Valentijn, v. 178.
1796.—"... I send you herewith for Dr. Roxburgh a specimen of Bughy Tusseh silk.... There are none of the Palma Christi species of Tusseh to be had here.... I have heard that there is another variation of the Tusseh silk-worm in the hills near Bauglipoor."—Letter of M. Atkinson, as above, in Linn. Trans., 1804, p. 41.
1802.—"They (the insects) are found in such abundance over many parts of Bengal and the adjoining provinces as to have afforded to the natives, from time immemorial, an abundant supply of a most durable, coarse, dark-coloured silk, commonly called Tusseh silk, which is woven into a cloth called Tusseh doot'hies, much worn by Bramins and other sects of Hindoos."—Roxburgh, Ibid. 34.
c. 1809.—"The chief use to which the tree (Terminalia elata, or Asan) is however applied, is to rear the Tasar silk."—Buchanan, Eastern India, ii. 157 seqq.
[1817.—"A thick cloth, called tusuru, is made from the web of the gootee insect in the district of Veerbhoomee."—Ward, Hindoos, 2d ed. i. 85.]