lathi

English

A group of police with wooden and plastic lathi in Panaji, Gao, India.

A drawing from 1908 of a police officer with a lathi on his belt in Kolkata, West Bengal, India.

Borrowed from Hindi लाठी (lāṭhī).

lathi (countable and uncountable, plural lathis)

(India, countable) A heavy stick or club, usually used by policemen.
- 1973, JG Farrell, The Siege of Krishnapur:
  The iron-bound bamboo staves, known as lâtees, with which most disputes among rival zemindars were traditionally settled.
- 2004, Khushwant Singh, Burial at Sea, Penguin, published 2014, page 131:
  A phalanx of policemen armed with lathis faced a mob of mill workers squatting on the road.
- 2008, Amitav Ghosh, Sea of Poppies, Penguin, published 2015, page 94:
  Nearby, held back by a line of lathi-carrying peons, stood the farmers whose vessels were being weighed […].
(uncountable) A martial art based on stick fighting originally practiced in India.
Lathi shares its basic principles with other martial arts.

“lathi”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.

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