iwana
iguana
English from Taíno
“The Taíno name for their largest lizard became the English word for reptiles they'd never seen.”
Iguana comes from Taíno iwana — the name for the large herbivorous lizards of the Caribbean. Spanish recorded it as iguana in the early 1500s.
The Taíno ate iguanas and valued them as a food source. Columbus reported that the Taíno served iguana at feasts. To Europeans, who had never seen such large lizards, the creatures were both fascinating and horrifying.
The word spread beyond its original meaning: English now uses 'iguana' for many species across the Americas, not just the Caribbean green iguana the Taíno named.
Like so many Taíno words, 'iguana' entered European languages rapidly — the colonizers needed names for creatures they'd never imagined, and the local words were already perfect.
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Today
Iguana is now a standard English word — used for pet shops, biology textbooks, and wildlife documentaries. The Taíno word has been completely naturalized.
The Taíno named their world with precision. Their words for that world — canoe, hurricane, hammock, tobacco, barbecue, iguana — became the world's words.
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