List of English Words From Indigenous Languages of The Americas | List English Words Indigenous Languages Americas

List Of English Words From Indigenous Languages Of The Americas

This is a list of English language words borrowed from indigenous languages of the Americas, either directly or through intermediate European languages such as Spanish or French. † indicates a link to a definition of the word. It does not cover names of ethnic groups or place names derived from indigenous languages.

Most words of Native American/First Nations language origin are the common names for indigenous flora and fauna, or describe items of Native American or First Nations life and culture. Some few are names applied in honor of Native Americans or First Nations peoples or due to a vague similarity to the original object of the word. For instance, sequoias are named in honor of the Cherokee leader Sequoyah, who lived 2,000 miles east of that tree's range while the kinkajou of South America was given a name from an unrelated North American animal 2,000 miles to the north.

Famous quotes containing the words list of, list, english, words, indigenous, languages and/or americas:

“Thirty—the promise of a decade of loneliness, a thinning list of single men to know, a thinning brief-case of enthusiasm, thinning hair.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)

“Lovers, forget your love,
And list to the love of these,
She a window flower,
And he a winter breeze.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)

“It is an equal failing to trust everybody, and to trust nobody.”
—18th-century English proverb.

“Where words are restrained, the eyes often talk a great deal.”
—Samuel Richardson (1689–1761)

“What is a country without rabbits and partridges? They are among the most simple and indigenous animal products; ancient and venerable families known to antiquity as to modern times; of the very hue and substance of Nature, nearest allied to leaves and to the ground,—and to one another; it is either winged or it is legged. It is hardly as if you had seen a wild creature when a rabbit or a partridge bursts away, only a natural one, as much to be expected as rustling leaves.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

“The less sophisticated of my forbears avoided foreigners at all costs, for the very good reason that, in their circles, speaking in tongues was commonly a prelude to snake handling. The more tolerant among us regarded foreign languages as a kind of speech impediment that could be overcome by willpower.”
—Barbara Ehrenreich (b. 1941)

“The only history is a mere question of one’s struggle inside oneself. But that is the joy of it. One need neither discover Americas nor conquer nations, and yet one has as great a work as Columbus or Alexander, to do.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)