7 Indigenous Taino Words You Probably Already Know – Part 8: Canoe

This is the last blog in our 8 blog series about 7 indigenous Taino words you might know. I hope you enjoyed the series. Check our blog to read the previous posts.

Canoe

The word "canoe" is the anglicized version of the Taino word phonetically spelled in Spanish as canoa. Early English spellings of this word varied considerably: cano, canow, canoa. However, by around 1600, canoe had come to be the most accepted spelling.

The word canoe is a good example of a "ghost word," which is a word whose meaning or origin is inaccurately recorded in an authoritative reference. It thus becomes widely accepted and it is difficult to correct the false perception once it has pervaded a society. For a long time, most people thought the word "canoe" originated from a word used by one of the native peoples of what is now the United States. However, this turns out to be false and was caused by a transcription error of a scribe in the late 15th century.

Canoe adventure Chavon River

Both our Junge Eco Tour and our Tanama river day include canoeing on the Chavon river. You can participate in our canoe adventure to a little side river of the Rio Chavon. We go deeper into the jungle and have to navigate through hanging lians and around fallen trees. We might see the fresh water turtles here.

To conclude the series

So there you have it, 7 common words in English that you have probably been using most of your life: potato, barbeque, cannibal, hammock, manatee, hurricane, and canoe. It is heart-warming to think that the words of a language that has been declared extinct live on as everyday words spoken by so many. Every time you speak these 7 Taino words, you honor the Taino people who were forbidden to speak their own language as a tool to conquer them.