pagoda

noun

Etymology: From Portuguese pagode (“Hindu temple, Hindu idol, pagoda coin”), from any of various Dravidian languages' words of respectful address to Hindu gods and idols and their temples, including Malayalam പകോതി (pakōti, “Durga temple”), Kannada, and Tamil பகவதி (pakavati, “Durga, Parvati”), possibly corrupted under the influence of Portuguese pagão (“pagan”), all ultimately from Sanskrit भगवती (bhagavatī, “Holy One, used for goddesses”). Previously but mistakenly connected with various other languages from Persia to China.

1. A Hindu temple.

   “This King of Calycut was a Bramene, as others his Predeceſſours alſo were, which amongſt the Malabars are Prieſts, and for that it is a cuſtome and anncient order obſerved, that all the Kings doe dye in one Pagode, which is the houſe of praiers to their Idolls...”

   “All your Religious Women who assist at the Performances of Pagod Ceremonies, are unexceptionably great Whores.”

2. A tall building in an Indian, Burmese, or Thai style erected at Hindu or Buddhist temples in South and Southeast Asia, a stupa surmounted with a high point.
3. A multi-storey tower in a Chinese style used in various contexts across East Asia and Nepal, usually with upturned curving roofs above each storey.

   “He declared he would ascend the highest pinnacle of the highest pagod in Japan.”

   “On the journey southwards over the flat, fertile plains, paddy fields stretched away on each side of the line, and the landscape was broken only by wooden villages and stately pagodas.”

4. Alternative form of pagod, an idol, chiefly in South and Southeast Asia.
5. A unit of currency, a coin made of gold or half gold, issued by various dynasties and colonial powers in southern India.

   “[T]he Mahrattas having offered Alimerdy Khan his liberty for a lak of Pagodas; he does in the Nabob's name desire that the Governor of Madras would receive jewels and money to that amount into his custody, […]”

   “I, in about two hours, notwithstanding the utmost caution, found myself minus upwards of six hundred pagodas […] .”

6. Short for pagoda sleeve.