sb. Also 9 thag, theg, t’hug. [a. Hindī ṭhag, Mahr. ṭhag, ṭhak a cheat, swindler.] (With capital T.) One of an association of professional robbers and murderers in India, who strangled their victims; a p’hansigar. Also attrib.
Their methods were described already in Thevenot’s Voyages, c. 1665 (see Yule). They are mentioned under their more correct name of p’hansigars (phanseegurs), i.e., ‘stranglers,’ by Forbes, Orient. Mem., IV. 13 (1813), and as Thugs, Thags, or Thegs from 1810. Their suppression was rigidly prosecuted from 1831, and the system is now practically extinct.
1810. in Hist. & Pract. Thugs, xxi. (1837), 329. It having come to the knowledge of Government, that several Sepoys … have been robbed and murdered by a description of persons denominated ‘Thugs,’ who infested the districts of the Dooab and other parts of the Upper Provinces.
1816. in Asiat. Res., XIII. 287. The term ‘Theg’ is usually applied, in the western provinces, to persons who rob and murder travellers on the highways, either by poison, or the application of the cord or knife.
1839. M. Taylor, Confess. Thug (1873), 2. You know not the high and stirring excitement of a Thug’s occupation.
1871. Contra Costa Gaz. (CA), 25 March, 1/4. The authorities of Calcutta were making strong efforts to suppress the sect of Thugs, who, you well know, are a band of fanatics, who make murder a part of their religion.
1897. Daily News, 22 Sept., 6/4. When the Prince of Wales was in India, a Thug criminal showed him how victims were strangled.
b. transf. A cutthroat, ruffian, rough. Now U.S.
1839. Carlyle, Chartism, i. 4. ‘Glasgow Thuggery,’ ‘Glasgow Thugs’; it is a witty nickname.
1878. Selma Times, 15 Aug., 4/1. A Thug seized a valuable satchel from the seat of a New York car and ran…. A Thug had made off with a costly diamond earring.
1883. Cable, in Century Mag., June, 230/1. A few ‘thugs’ terrorized the city with … beating, stabbing, and shooting.
1889. Boston (Mass.) Jrnl., 24 April, 1/8. Thugs, plug-uglies, and ‘flash sports.’
1895. J. Burns, in Westm. Gaz., 17 Jan., 2/1. They even engage ‘knockers-out,’ who … belabour and disable voters as they are entering the booths…. They are called ‘election Thugs.’
Hence Thug v., trans. to assassinate by thuggee; Thugdom, the domain of Thugs; Thuggess, a female Thug; Thuggism, the practice and principles of Thugs: = next.
1837. Edin. Rev., Jan., 369. If a single civilian or military man had been thugged, thuggee would have been abolished long ago.
1839. De Quincey, Murder, ad fin. At length came the toast of the day—Thugdom in all its branches.
1856. Froude, Hist. Eng., I. ii. 155. What teachers of Thuggism would appear to ourselves, the teachers of heresy actually appeared to Sir Thomas More.
1859. Lang, Wand. India, 100. The victim, another Thuggess, was supposed to be sleeping when the operation was performed.
1903. Daily Chron., 4 Dec., 5/2. Lord William Bentinck is … known for his suppression of Thuggism, which made strangling a religious rite to the goddess Kali.
