different between sepoy vs havildar

English

Etymology

From Portuguese sipae, from Urdu ?????? (sip?h?)/Hindi ?????? (sip?h?), from Persian ?????? (sepâhi, “soldier, horseman”), from ????? (sepâh, “army”). Doublet of spahi.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?si??p??/
• Hyphenation: se?poi

Noun

sepoy (plural sepoys)

1. (historical) A native soldier of the East Indies, employed in the service of a European colonial power, notably the British India army (first under the British-chartered East India Company, later in the crown colony), but also France and Portugal.
   • 1997, Charles E. Davies, The Blood-red Arab Flag: An Investigation Into Qasimi Piracy, 1797-1820, University of Exeter Press (?ISBN), page 312:

     They proved to be the wives of a body of sepoys, also from the 5th Regiment of Bombay Native Infantry; the sepoys had perished, and their families been enslaved, when their pattamar had been captured by the Qawasim some months before.

Translations

Descendants

• ? Chinese: ???
• ? Dutch: sepoy, sipoy
  • ? Indonesian: sepoy
• ? German: Sepoy
• ? Italian: sepoy
• ? Swedish: sepoy
  • ? Finnish: sepoy
• ? Turkish: sepoy

Further reading

• “sepoy”, in Merriam–Webster Online Dictionary, (Please provide a date or year).
• “sepoy”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–present.
• “sepoy” in TheFreeDictionary.com, Huntingdon Valley, Pa.: Farlex, Inc., 2003–2021.
• “sepoy” in the Collins English Dictionary

References

Anagrams

• Posey, poesy, posey, poyse, poësy

Dutch

Noun

sepoy m (plural sepoys, diminutive sepoytje n)

1. A sepoy, native soldier in the East Indies

English

Alternative forms

• havaldar

Etymology

Hindi ??????? (havild?r), from Persian ???????? (havâldâr), from Arabic ????????? (?aw?la, “charge”) + Persian ???? (dâr, “holder”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?hav?ld??/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?hæv?ld??/

Noun

havildar (plural havildars)

1. A type of soldier in parts of India, later a specific military rank of the British Indian Army and of the modern armies of India and Pakistan, equivalent to sergeant.
   • 1888, Rudyard Kipling, ‘At Howli Thana’, Black and White, Folio Society 2005, p. 388:

     ‘There was a great fight,’ said the Havildar, ‘and of us no man escaped unhurt.’

   • 1990, Peter Hopkirk, The Great Game, Folio Society 2010, p. 406:

     On being congratulated by the Russian, the Gurkha havildar, or sergeant, whispered anxiously to Younghusband that he should inform the towering Gromchevsky that they were unusually small and that most Gurkhas were even taller than he was.

   • 1997, Kiran Nagarkar, Cuckold, HarperCollins 2013, p. 252:

     The word is that every petty havaldar, sub-inspector and police inspector, licensing clerk and petty official has to be bribed before he'll do his duty.