c. 1544.—"Out of this Lake of Singapamor ... do four very large and deep rivers proceed, whereof the first ... runneth Eastward through all the Kingdoms of Sornau and Siam ...; the Second, Jangumaa ... disimboking into the Sea by the Bar of Martabano in the Kingdom of Pegu...."—Pinto (in Cogan, 165).
1553.—(Barros illustrates the position of the different kingdoms of India by the figure of a (left) hand, laid with the palm downwards) "And as regards the western part, following always the sinew of the forefinger, it will correspond with the ranges of mountains running from north to south along which lie the kingdom of Avá, and Bremá, and Jangomá."—III. ii. 5.
c. 1587.—"I went from Pegu to Iamayhey, which is in the Countrey of the Langeiannes, whom we call Iangomes; it is five and twentie dayes iourney to Northeast from Pegu.... Hither to Iamayhey come many Merchants out of China, and bring great store of Muske, Gold, Silver, and many things of China worke."—R. Fitch, in Hakl. ii.
c. 1606.—"But the people, or most part of them, fled to the territories of the King of Jangoma, where they were met by the Padre Friar Francisco, of the Annunciation, who was there negotiating ..."—Bocarro, 136.
1612.—"The Siamese go out with their heads shaven, and leave long mustachioes on their faces; their garb is much like that of the Peguans. The same may be said of the Jangomas and the Laojoes" (see [LAN JOHN]).—Couto, V. vi. 1.
c. 1615.—"The King (of Pegu) which now reigneth ... hath in his time recovered from the King of Syam ... the town and kingdom of Zangomay, and therein an Englishman called Thomas Samuel, who not long before had been sent from Syam by Master Lucas Anthonison, to discover the Trade of that country by the sale of certaine goods sent along with him for that purpose."—W. Methold, in Purchas, v. 1006.
[1617.—"Jangama." See under [JUDEA].
[1795.—"Zemee." See under [SHAN].]
JAPAN, n.p. Mr. Giles says: "Our word is from Jeh-pun, the Dutch orthography of the Japanese Ni-pon." What the Dutch have to do with the matter is hard to see. ["Our word 'Japan' and the Japanese Nihon or Nippon, are alike corruptions of Jih-pen, the Chinese pronunciation of the characters (meaning) literally 'sun-origin.'" (Chamberlain, Things Japanese, 3rd ed. 221).] A form closely resembling Japán, as we pronounce it, must have prevailed, among foreigners at least, in China as early as the 13th century; for Marco Polo calls it Chipan-gu or Jipan-ku, a name representing the Chinese Zhi-păn-Kwe ('Sun-origin-Kingdom'), the Kingdom of the Sunrise or Extreme Orient, of which the word Nipon or Niphon, used in Japan, is said to be a dialectic variation. But as there was a distinct gap in Western tradition between the 14th century and the 16th, no doubt we, or rather the Portuguese, acquired the name from the traders at Malacca, in the Malay forms, which Crawfurd gives as Jăpung and Jăpang.
1298.—"Chipangu is an Island towards the east in the high seas, 1,500 miles distant from the Continent; and a very great Island it is. The people are white, civilized, and well-favoured. They are Idolaters, and dependent on nobody...."—Marco Polo, bk. iii. ch. 2.