bashaw

• bassa [16th–18th c.]
• bassaw (obsolete)

Variant of pasha, several forms or relatives of which start with /b-/, e.g. Arabic بَاشَا (bāšā).

• IPA^(key): /bəˈʃɔː/
• Rhymes: -ɔː

bashaw (plural bashaws)

1. (now rare, historical) A pasha. [16th–19th c.]
   • 1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Printed by John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition II, section 2, member 4:

     Radzivilius was much taken with the bassa’s palace in Cairo […].

   • 1630, John Smith, True Travels, Kupperman, published 1988, page 44:

     The Bashaw notwithstanding drew together a partie of five hundred before his owne Pallace, where he intended to die […].

   • 1809, James Grey Jackson, An Account of the Empire of Marocco, London, page 79:

     he fancies himself in company with beautiful women; he dreams that he is an emperor, or a bashaw, and that the world is at his nod.

   • 1982, TC Boyle, Water Music, Penguin, published 2006, page 7:

     Insecure about his infirmity, the Bashaw decreed that all who desired to come into his presence must first submit to having their eyes put out.

2. (archaic, often derogatory, by extension) A grandee. [from 16th c.]
3. A very large siluroid fish (Pylodictis olivaris) of the Mississippi valley; the goujon or mudcat.

• Wabash, Wahabs