Dictionary

squaw en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• (Southern-England) audio
• /skwɔː/

Etymology

From Massachusett squàw (“woman”), from Proto-Algonquian *eθkwe·wa (“(young) woman”). Cognate with Abenaki -skwa (“female, wife”), Mohegan-Pequot sqá, Cree iskwew / ᐃᐢᑫᐧᐤ (iskeyw, “woman”), Ojibwe ikwe (“woman”). In the 1970s, some non-linguists began to claim that the word originally meant vagina; this has been discredited. The first English attestation of the word is found in a book called Mourt’s Relation: A Journey of the Pilgrims at Plymouth written in 1622, where the "squa sachim or Massachusets Queen" is mentioned in a journal entry from September 20, 1621.

Meanings

1. (ethnic, offensive, slur) A woman, wife; especially a Native American woman.
   • "If I ever set eyes on that savage again, I'll kill him. You know that, don't you, you damn squaw?" She shrugged. "Talk's cheap." 1950, Dorothy M. Johnson, Flame on the Frontier; in Indian Country, London: Corgi, 1961, page 29:
   • The Indian maids, of course, turned out to be a few fat old squaws who knew all about white men. 1963, Lester del Rey, The Sky Is Falling:

Forms

Deriveds

squaw winter · squaw tea · squawdom · squaw carpet · squawberry · squaw dress · squawbush · squawlike · squaw flower · squaw vine · Squaw Valley · squaw mint · squawroot · squawweed · oldsquaw · squaw man · squaw huckleberry · squaw candy · squawvine · Squaw Grove · squawfish

Translations (5)

bg индианка (a woman, wife; especially a Native American woman) · ru скво (a woman, wife; especially a Native American woman) · eo skvo (a woman, wife; especially a Native American woman) · fr squaw (a woman, wife; especially a Native American woman) · pl squaw (a woman, wife; especially a Native American woman)