Page:Assamese-Its formation and development.djvu/38

2 INTRODUCTION ing Shans. In Sankar Carit, by Daityari Thakur of the seventeenth century, the Shans have been variously designat- ed as Asam, Asam, Asam. In Kdmrupar Buranji, of a much later date, occurs the form Acam also. No satisfactory explanation has yet been offered by his- torians as to how the term Asam with variants came to 'be applied to the tribe. Grierson notes that the word Shan is a Burmese corruption of the original word Sham. (L.S.I., Vol. II. p. 59) . Dr. P. C. Bagchi equates Shan with Sien-Syam (Syam of the Khmer inscriptions and Sien of the Chinese sources) and traces Ahom, the modern Assamese designation of the Tai people, to Sicn-Syam (P. C. Pagchi : Foreword to The Indian Colony of Siam by P. N. Bose p. vii) . 3. The modern Assamese word Ahom, by which the Tai people are known evidently goes back to early Assamese Asam ; Asam > Asam > Ah am, Ahom. The last syllable of Asam might very well be connected with Sham but the initial vowel A-, would remain unexplained, A-, as a prefix having a privative or derogatory significance. Following the tradition of the Ahoms themselves, Sir Edward Gait suggests that the term Asdm in the sense of " unequalled " or " peerless " was applied to the Shans by the local tribes in token of their admiration of the way in which the Shans first conquered and then conciliated them. Though the rude Mongolian tribes could not have been expected to be acquainted with a learned Sanskrit derivative like Asam. yet Sir Edward considers it very probable that this derivation is after all the right one, — in whatever way the word might have come into use (History of Assam, p. 246) . In slight amplification of Sir Edward's con- clusion it may be added that Asdma. peerless, may be a latter- day Sanskritisation of some earlier form like Acham. In Tai (AK6m) , y/Cham, means " to be defeated ". With the privative Assamese prefix A-, the whole formation Asam would mean " undefeated, " " conquerors, " being thus a hybrid equivalent of the word Thai (Tai) meaning " free " as opposed to Camuwd, (*Camuwa<*Chamuwa), an Ah5m subject of a respectable ♦Prof, (now Dr.) S. K. Bhuyan notes in his introduction to Tungkhungia Buranji (pp. xxix, xxx) that the adult popu-