sowar

English

Etymology

From Hindi/Urdu सवार (savār)/سوار (savār), from Classical Persian سوار (sawār, “horseman”).

Noun

sowar (plural sowars)

1. (historical, India) A soldier on horseback, especially one during the British Raj.
   • 1887, Thomas Stevens, chapter XII, in Around the World on a Bicycle‎^[1], Vol. II: From Teheran to Yokohama, London: Sampson Low […] :

     I have been laboring under the impression that, for soul-harrowing vocal effort, the wild-eyed sowars of Khorassan, as exemplified in my escort from Beerjand, were entitled to the worst execrations of a discriminating Ferenghi, but the Afghans can go them one better.

   • 1897, Frederick Sleigh Roberts, Forty-one years in India‎^[2]:

     Among the latter was Hope Grant, who had his horse shot under him in a charge, and was saved by the devotion of two men of his own regiment (the 9th Lancers) and a Mahomedan sowar of the 4th Irregular Cavalry.

   • 1910, Charles John Griffiths, A Narrative Of The Siege Of Delhi‎^[3]:

     Hills was struck down badly wounded, and was on the point of being despatched by a sowar, when Major Tombs, hearing the noise, rushed out of his tent, and seeing the plight his subaltern was in, fired his revolver at thirty yards and killed the sowar.

Alternative forms

• suwar

Related terms

• Savari
• sowarree

Maranao

Noun

sowar

1. horn (clarification of this definition is needed)