Also 8 avarria, avaria. [In common use in the Levant, but of uncertain language and origin; in It. and Pg. avanía, F. avanie, mod.Gr. ἀβανία, Arab. and Turk. awānī, also found as awārī (Devic), and in Bocthor sawān, and sawānia. See below. Also in 17th c. anglicised as AVENY, q.v.]
An imposition by the (Turkish) government, a compulsory tax, government exaction, ‘aid,’ ‘benevolence’ (Marsh); spec. (as applied by Christians) an extortionate exaction or tax levied by the Turks. Hence Avanious a., extortionate.
1687. Rycaut, Hist. Turks, II. 251. The trading Christian enjoyed the privilege of their Capitulations with … less frequent Avanias. Ibid., II. 62. Their extravagant Exactions, and Avanious Practices.
1703. Maundrell, Journ. Jerus. (1721), 93. Their perpetual extortion and Avarria’s.
a. 1733. North, Lives, II. 420. False and extortious demands which they call Avanias. Ibid., III. 1. title, The avanious demand of the Tunis Basha.
1751. Chambers, Cycl., Avaria.
[The etymology of avania has been variously sought in Arabic, Persian, Turkish: see Devic, in Littré’s Suppt., and G. P. Marsh, Notes and Additions to Wedgwood. The variant Arabic form awārī (whence Eng. avaria, avarria, above) as well as original correspondence of meaning, suggests a connection with It. avaría—see AVERAGE sb.2: in fact Mr. Marsh proposed the derivation of the latter from this word. But on the other hand, the various and uncertain forms of the word in Arabic may be merely adaptations of Fr. avarie or It. avaría, assimilated to native words or roots (e.g., awār oppression, injustice, hawān contempt, etc.) ‘The plur. aavaniet is now in popular use in Syria, to express government exactions, the singular signifying aid, help, just as benevolence in Europe sometimes meant a compulsory tax’ (Marsh). The word has been adopted in It. and Pg. in the transferred sense: It. avanía ‘an undeserved wrong, a secret grudge, an insulting injury’ (Florio); Pg. avanía ‘wrong, injury’ (Vieyra).]
