Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymological, Historical, Geographical and Discursive c10.412

c10.412

**ANDOR**, *s.* Port. ‘a litter,’ and used in the old Port. writers for a palankin. It was evidently a kind of Muncheel or Dandy, *i.e.* a slung hammock rather than a palankin. But still, as so often is the case, comes in another word to create perplexity. For *andas* is, in Port., a bier or a litter, appearing in Bluteau as a genuine Port. word, and the use of which by the writer of the Roteiro quoted below shows that it is so indeed. And in defining *Andor* the same lexicographer says: “A portable vehicle in India, in those regions where they do not use beasts, as in Malabar and elsewhere. It is a kind of contrivance like an uncovered *Andas*, which men bear on their shoulders, &c. . . . Among us *Andor* is a machine with four arms in which images or reliques of the saints are borne in processions.” This last term is not, as we had imagined an old Port. word. It is Indian, in fact Sanskrit, *hindola*, ‘a swing, a swinging cradle or hammock,’ whence also Mahr. *hindolā*, and H. *hindolā* or *handolā*. It occurs, as will be seen, in the old Ar. work about Indian wonders, published by MM. Van der Lith and Marcel Devic. [To this Mr Skeat adds that in Malay *andor* means ‘a buffalo-sledge for carting rice,’ &c. It would appear to be the same as the Port. word, though it is hard to say which is the original.]