Thugs of Hindustan
"The robbery and murder practiced by the Thugs in accordance with their ritual." - Definition of thuggee from the Oxford dictionary. The " thugs " were groups of professional assassins who had specialized themselves in the art of deceiving and killing travelers on the country roads during medieval India. The word thug is derived from the Hindi word " thag ", which means thief or swindler, which itself is derived from the Sanskrit word " staghati ", which means to conceal or deceive, and was coined to refer to the infamous and secretive cult of assassins in medieval India. The word "thug" was first mentioned in a book written during the reign of Delhi king Firoz Shah Tughlaq in the 13th century. This cult is estimated to have been responsible for thousands of killings per year for over 4 centuries and continued to remain highly secretive until the 18th century, when the British in India decided to eradicate the thugs.