bayou

Etymology

It comes through the French of colonial Louisiana: borrowed from French bayou, earlier bayouque,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} written Bayoue in its first English record of 1766 and bayou from 1803.^[7][8] Most dictionaries take the French word from Choctaw bayuk (“small stream; creek, river forming part of a delta”),^{[4][7][9][10][11][12][13][14]} and the American Heritage Dictionary adds that it probably came through Mobilian Jargon, a pidgin based on Choctaw and Chickasaw that was used along the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico from colonial times until the 1900s.^[2] Others are more cautious: the fourth edition of the American Heritage Dictionary calls the Choctaw source possible,^[15] Dictionary.com says the word is "said to be" Choctaw,^[14] and Merriam-Webster derives it perhaps from an early *bayok, the source of Choctaw bo·k (“creek, river”).^[3] Weekley derived it instead from French boyau (“gut”), the source of bowel,^[16] and Bartlett (1848) also gave the French word, glossing it "a gulf".^[17]

Earliest recorded meaning

A marshy offshoot or overflow of a lake or river in the southern United States: 1766, in H. Gordon's journal of travels, "We left New Orleans .. and lay that night at the Bayoue".^{[9][12][4][7]} Merriam-Webster dates the word to 1763,^[3] and Dictionary.com to 1710–20.^[14]

Semantic evolution

The word has stayed a regional term of the American South, especially of Louisiana.^[12][9][10] In 1826 Timothy Flint explained it as a stream of alluvial land with little current, sometimes leaving the main river and joining it again like a side canal,^[12] and a 1916 report from New Orleans used it for any natural narrow body of water except a river.^[12] Spellings that reflect local pronunciation, such as byo in Davy Crockett's Narrative (1834) and bio in 1843, are recorded by DARE.^[12]

Timeline

• 1766 – a marshy offshoot of a lake or river, spelled Bayoue.^[9][7][12] Merriam-Webster dates the word to 1763.^[3]
• 1803 – the spelling bayou.^[7][8]
• 1826 – a sluggish alluvial stream, in Flint's Recollections.^[12]
• 1834 – the spelling byo, in Crockett's Narrative.^[12]

Meanings

Noun

1. In the southern United States, especially Louisiana, a slow-moving, often marshy creek or minor river that winds through low ground: Cypress trees lined the bayou.^{[3][5][9][12]}
2. A creek or secondary watercourse that is a tributary of a river or lake.^[3][12]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
3. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
6. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
8. ^ a b Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
9. ^ a b c d e Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ Gove, Philip Babcock, ed. (1961), Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam
12. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Cassidy, Frederic G. & Joan Houston Hall (eds.) (1985–2002), Dictionary of American Regional English, vols I–IV, Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
13. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
14. ^ a b c Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
15. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (2000), 4th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
16. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
17. ^ Bartlett, John Russell (1848), Dictionary of Americanisms, New York: Bartlett and Welford