Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymological, Historical, Geographical and Discursive c10.435

c10.435

ANILE, NEEL, s. An old name for indigo, borrowed from the Port. anil. They got it from the Ar. al-nil, pron. an-nil; nil again being the common name of indigo in India, from the Skt. nīla, 'blue.' The vernacular (in this instance Bengali) word appears in the title of a native satirical drama Nil-Darpan, 'The Mirror of Indigo (planting),' famous in Calcutta in 1861, in connection with a cause célèbre, and with a sentence which discredited the now extinct Supreme Court of Calcutta in a manner unknown since the days of Impey.