bayou

Forms

bayou m (plural bayous)^[1] Older spellings bayouk (1699), baijou (1740) and bayouc.^[2][3][4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Choctaw bayuk (“small river, creek”).^[2][1][3][4] The TLFi dates the adaptation to the second half of the 17th century, when the French first explored Louisiana.^[2] Rey describes it as a word of the French of the Cajuns of Louisiana.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

It is first recorded in 1699 as bayouk, for a stretch of still water that the native people called by that name, “shallow or stagnant water, a side channel of a river” in Louisiana.^[2][5]

Semantic evolution

The form baijou is found in 1740 with the sense “small river”, and bayou in 1758, when Le Page de Pratz described it as a large stream of dead water with little or no current.^[2] The word then passed into geography with a wider sense (1869),^[4] and was also applied to river channels in Africa.^[6] American English took bayou from Louisiana French in 1766.^[7]

Timeline

• 1699 – Bayouk is recorded in Louisiana.^[2][3][4]
• 1740 – Baijou “small river” appears in a journal of the Mississippi war.^[2]
• 1758 – Bayou is used by Le Page de Pratz in his history of Louisiana.^[2][6]
• 1766 – English bayou is first recorded.^[7]
• 1869 – The word is used in geography outside Louisiana, of Africa.^[4][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. In Louisiana and the lower Mississippi, a body of shallow, slow-moving or stagnant water: a side channel of a river or a lake left in an abandoned meander.^[2][8][9]
2. (Louisiana) A stream, a small river.^[1]

Usage notes

In the French of New Caledonia a separate feminine noun bayou, from Indonesian bayu “elder sister”, a form of address, means a cleaning woman, and also an Indonesian woman; it is familiar and dated.^[4][10]

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Trésor de la langue française informatisé (2004), ATILF – CNRS & Université de Lorraine, atilf.fr/tlfi; electronic version of Imbs, Paul; Quemada, Bernard, eds. (1971–1994), Trésor de la langue française, Paris: CNRS / Gallimard
3. ^ a b c Rey, Alain, ed. (2005), Le Grand Robert de la langue française, electronic version, Paris: Le Robert
4. ^ a b c d e f g Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
5. ^ Guilbert, Louis; Lagane, René; Niobey, Georges, eds. (1971–1978; 1989), Grand Larousse de la langue française, Paris: Larousse
6. ^ a b c Quemada, Bernard, ed. (1959–2006), Datations et documents lexicographiques (Base historique du vocabulaire français, BHVF), Paris: Klincksieck / CNRS / Champion; ATILF
7. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ Rey-Debove, Josette; Rey, Alain, eds. (2007), Le Petit Robert de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
9. ^ Dictionnaire de français Larousse, larousse.fr/dictionnaires/francais (accessed 2024)
10. ^ Base de données lexicographiques panfrancophone (BDLP), Trésor de la langue française au Québec / Agence universitaire de la Francophonie, bdlp.org