Forms: see below. [a. F. chamois (16th c. in Littré), prob. from Swiss Romanic: in Tyrolese camozza, camozz, Piedm. camossa, camoss, mod.Pr. camous, Rumansch camuotsch, chamotsch (Diez); It. camozza, camoscio (cf. camoscia chamois leather); Sp. camuza, gamuza, Pg. camuça, camurça. Presumably of the same origin as OHG. and MHG. gamz, mod.G. gemse; but the relations between the Teutonic and Romanic words have not been ascertained, and no etymology is known either in Latin or Teutonic. See Diez, Littré, Kluge.
The English form chamoy, chamoi, was doubtless partly at least due to the final -s being taken as a plural ending. The name of the animal is now always written chamois; but sense 2 is still frequently shammy and shamoy.]
1. (Forms: 6 shamoye, 7 shamois(e, shammois, 7–8 shamoys, 8 shammoy, chamoi, 6– chamois.) A capriform antelope (A. rupicapra or Rupicapra tragus), the only representative of the antelopes found wild in Europe; it inhabits the loftiest parts of the Alps, Pyrenees, Taurus, and other mountain ranges of Europe and Asia.
Its size is that of a full-grown goat; it is covered with brown hair, and has horns, about six inches long, which rise straight above the head, bending back so as to form complete hooks. Its agility and keenness of scent make its chase most difficult and exciting. (The ‘chamois’ of the English Bible is probably a moufflon.)
1560. Bible (Genev.), Deut. xiv. 5. The vnicorne, and the wilde oxe, and the chamois [1535 Coverd. camelion].
1598. Florio, Muffri, a kind of beast like a shamoye or wild goate.
1601. Holland, Pliny, II. 332. The wilde Shamois.
1623. Cockeram, II. A wilde Goate, Shamoise.
1704. Collect. Voy. (Churchill), III. 44/2. The Animals called Guanaco’s, Chamoi’s, or Wild-Goats.
1728. Scheuchzer, in Phil. Trans., XXXV. 591. A Height, which the … Shamoys themselves scarce venture to ascend.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist., II. 38. The shammoy is to be found only in rocky and mountainous places.
1783. Ainsworth, Lat. Dict. (Morell), I. A chamoise.
1789. Mrs. Piozzi, Journ. France, I. 38. I had the satisfaction of seeing a chamois at a distance.
1871. Darwin, Desc. Man, I. iv. (1885), 100. Rabbits stamp loudly on the ground with their hind-feet as a signal! Sheep and chamois do the same with their fore-feet.
b. attrib. and Comb.; also chamois-like a. & adv.
1580. Hollyband, Treas. Fr. Tong, A Chamoise skinne.
1829. Scott, Anne of G., ii. I am no chamois-hunter.
1832. G. Downes, Lett. Cont. Countries, I. 103. A chamois-hunting ditty.
a. 1835. Mrs. Hemans, Shepherd, in Poems (1875), 512. The courage and the grace Foster’d by the chamois-chase.
1875. B. Taylor, Faust, III. II. 217. Chamois-like dost thou aspire?
2. (Forms: 6 shameuse, shamway, 6–7 shamoyes, 7 chamoyse, chamoy, chammois, 7– shamois, shamoy, chamois; also SHAMMY, q.v.) Originally, a leather, prepared from the skin of the chamois; now applied to a soft, pliable leather prepared from the skins of sheep, goats, deer, calves, and the split hides of other animals. More fully chamois- (shamoy, shammy-) leather; see quots. a. below.
a. 1575. Turberv., Falconrie, 140. Of shameuse leather or soft calves leather or such other leather as maye bee gentle and plyaunte to hir legge.
1588. R. Parke, trans. Mendoza’s Hist. China, 328. Hides and shamway skins very well dressed.
1668. Rolle, Abridgm., 63. He hath cozened you, and hath sold you Lamb-skins instead of Shamoys-skins.
1822. Imison, Sc. & Art, II. 347. Pieces of soft shamoy leather.
1827. Faraday, Chem. Manip., xx. 539. Squeeze it through a piece of shamois leather.
1877. Blackmore, Erema, lii. What she had kept for years in a bag of chamois-leather.
b. 1588. R. Parke, trans. Mendoza’s Hist. China, 334. Many mantles, and shamwayes very well dressed.
1594. Blundevil, Exerc., V. iii. (ed. 7), 533. Buffe, Shamoyes, striped Marokines.
1611. Beaum. & Fl., Scornf. Lady, II. ii. Let thy bounty Clap him in shamois.
1633. Batt. Lutzen, in Harl. Misc. (Malh.), IV. The king … forthwith called for a new sute of chammois.
1693. Evelyn, De la Quint. Compl. Gard., II. 114. Shreads of Sheep’s-Skin, or Shamoy.
1720. Stow’s Surv. (ed. Strype), 1754, II. V. xi. 292/1. Rams skins and sheep skins sold for right shamoises … to the wrong and hindrance of the buyer.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1862), I. II. iii. 307. The leather called shammoy is made also from those [the skins] of the tame goat, the sheep, and the deer.
1831. Carlyle, Misc., II. 231. Softer than the softest shamoy.
1837. Goring & Pritchard, Microgr., 20. A bit of chamois or wash-leather perfectly free from dust.
c. attrib. as name of a material.
1603. Florio, Montaigne (1632), 145. Plaine chamoy-jerkins.
1638. Shirley, Mart. Soldier, II. i. in Bullen, O. Pl., I. 190. A Shamoyes Doublet.
1724. Lond. Gaz., No. 6255/2. Chamoy Shooes.
1825. Scott, Betrothed, xvi. His war-worn shamoy doubler.
3. Of the color of this leather, yellowish brown or fawn-colored.
1882. Garden, 24 June, 436/1. Mdme. Serret, creamy white, suffused with chamois.
1887. Pall Mall Gaz., 2 May, 13/2. It is … yellow—or, as stamp collectors might say—chamois in colour.
Hence Chamois (also shamois, chamoy) v. [F. chamoiser], to prepare leather in imitation of the chamois skin. Chamoised ppl. a., made of, or dressed like, chamois-leather.
1620. Shelton, Quix., II. xlvi. 300 (R.). Don Quixote … put on his Chamoized apparell and his Bootes, to hide the hole of his Stockings.
1727–52. Chambers, Cycl., s.v. Shammy, Manner of Shamoising, or of preparing sheep, goat, or kid-skins in oil, in imitation of Shammy.
1804. W. Nicholson, Jrnl. Nat. Phil., IX. 251 (title), Account of a Memoir on Chamoying or Leather.
Chamois, var. CAMOIS a. Obs. pug(nose), pug-nosed.
