A merchant or trader in India, particularly one involved in the textile or spice trade during the colonial period.
From Hindustani/Indian Portuguese, possibly from Hindi gumashta or related trading terminology; used in English colonial records to denote Indian merchants, particularly in the 17th-18th centuries.
This word appears in the oldest English trading documents from India—it's a linguistic snapshot of when European merchants were still learning Indian business structures and didn't have English words for these roles yet.
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