lathin.
/ˈlɑːti/, /lʌˈtiː/, U.S. /ˈlɑti/ Anglo-Indian.
A long heavy stick, usually of bamboo and bound with iron. Also attributive.
ΘΚΠ
society > armed hostility > military equipment > weapon > club or stick > [noun] > cane or switch
sallow twigc1440
ferule-rod1528
ferule1559
ferula1579
cane1590
ferular1594
saplinga1712
jemmy1753
bamboo rattan1796
sallow switch1802
lathi1850
1850 F. Parks Wanderings of Pilgrim I. xiv. 132 A very heavy lāthī, a solid male bamboo, five feet five inches long, headed with iron in a most formidable manner.
1860 W. H. Russell My Diary in India 1858–9 II. 317 Sometimes a peasant runs away with a long lathee or stick over his shoulder.
1860 W. H. Russell My Diary in India 1858–9 I. 145 Each man carries his bamboo latee shod with iron.
1864 G. O. Trevelyan Competition Wallah 170 Placing a lattee, which is the name for the quarter-staff carried by all Indian peasants, under the defaulter's knee.
1878 G. Graham Life in Mofussil I. 114 We came upon about a hundred men..all with latties..in their hands.
1895 B. M. Croker Village Tales (1896) 187 A man's body found in a nullah, killed by a sickle or a lathi (heavy stick).
1920 Glasgow Herald 31 Dec. 7 Some disturbance..in which lathis were used.
1924 R. Graves Mock Beggar Hall 64 Then the new power, foreseeing grave events Calls out the lathi-wallahs to line the streets.
1930 Daily Express 6 Nov. 3/6 The police made a number of lathi charges to disperse the crowd.
1936 J. Nehru Autobiogr. 177 My body felt the baton and lathi blows of the police.
1972 Times of India 28 Nov. 11/2 A judicial inquiry was demanded into the lathi-charge at Gulbarga.
1973 J. G. Farrell Siege of Krishnapur v. 69 The iron-bound bamboo staves, known as lâtees, with which most disputes among rival zemindars were traditionally settled.
This entry has not yet been fully updated (first published 1976; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1850