bashaw

English

Alternative forms

• bassa [16th-18th c.]
• bassaw (obsolete)

Etymology

Variant of pasha.

Pronunciation

• IPA: /bəˈʃɔː/

Noun

bashaw (plural bashaws)

1. (now rare, historical) A pasha. [16th-19th c.]
   • 1621, Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy, II.2.4:

     Radzivilius was much taken with the bassa’s palace in Cairo [...].

   • 1630, John Smith, True Travels, in Kupperman 1988, p. 44:

     The Bashaw notwithstanding drew together a partie of five hundred before his owne Pallace, where he intended to die [...].

   • 1809, James Grey Jackson, An Account of the Empire of Marocco, London 1809, p. 79:

     he fancies himself in company with beautiful women; he dreams that he is an emperor, or a bashaw, and that the world is at his nod.

   • 1982, TC Boyle, Water Music, Penguin 2006, p. 7:

     Insecure about his infirmity, the Bashaw decreed that all who desired to come into his presence must first submit to having their eyes put out.

2. (archaic, often pejorative, by extension) A grandee. [from 16th c.]
3. A very large siluroid fish (Leptops olivaris) of the Mississippi valley; the goujon or mudcat.