Vol. 09 · Loanwords ·Indigenous languages ·1660s
Barbecue
from barbacoa
- Meaning
- A wooden frame on posts — used for smoking, drying, or roasting meat.
- Source word
- barbacoa
- Route into English
- Taino → Spanish → English via 17th-century Caribbean colonial writing. The modern US backyard sense (grill + social event) evolved through 19th-century Southern political rallies.
- Arrived
- 1660s
From Indigenous languages
A loose group: Nahuatl, Taino, Algonquian, Guugu Yimithirr, and others. Colonial contact produced many loans; the speakers were often systematically dispossessed of the land the loanwords described.
English borrows.
Browse the full loanword atlas or explore another source language.