nabobship

plural nabobships

1. historicalThe rank or condition of a nabob.

   1687, Records of Fort St. George, Diary and Consultation Book, Madras: 1916, entry for November 1687, p. 180, […] Potty Cawn was discharged from his Nabobship, and return’d to his Governmᵗ att Changalaput […]

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   Abdulla, returning towards his government, was, the first night after his taking leave of the Nizam, found dead in his bed; not without suspicion of poison from Anwar ul Dien Chan, who succeeded him in the nabobship of Arcot, in the year 1157.

   1768, Firishta, translated by Alexander Dow, The History of Hindostan, London: T. Becket and P.A. de Hondt, Volume 2, Section 2, p. 33

   The first enceinte [of Surat] was constructed some years after, and the second some more than fifty years ago, under the nabobship of Hyder Kuli Khan

   1884, Dosabhai Framji Karaka, chapter 1, in History of the Parsis, volume 1, London: Macmillan, page 50

   “[…] Cook’ll be servin’ ragout of peacock, Bird of Paradise on toast, broiled ibis, nightingale’s brains—yew feelin’ all right, yer nabobship?”

   1987, Lin Carter, chapter 15, in Mandricardo, New York: Daw, page 132

2. archaicfigurativelyA position of extremely great wealth.

   1792, Edmund Randolph, letter dated 25 May, 1792, cited in Frances Norton Mason (ed.), John Norton & Sons, Merchants of London and Virginia, New York: A.M. Kelley, 1968, p. 503, He bought a coachee, and had his own horses from home. They travelled [in] the stile of ancient Virginia Nabobship.

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   1772, James Iredell, letter dated 20 July, 1772, cited in Don Higginbotham (ed.), The Papers of James Iredell, Raleigh, NC: Division of Archives and History, Department of Cultural Resources, 1976, p. 109, […] an encumbered West India Estate, with the tax of high living, is no Nabobship, and an unfortunate Crop is a very severe shock to such a one.

   1795, Noah Webster, quoted in the papers of Oliver Wolcott Jr., cited in Leonard D. White, The Federalists, New York: Macmillan, 1964, p. 273, If men, who are loading the govt with curses, & denouncing our Chief Magistrate, as a tyrant […] are to be raised to opulence and nabobship, […] who are the friends that will maintain that govt?