a member of an Indigenous Arawakan tribe of the Caribbean: the Taíno once dominated the populations of Cuba, Hispaniola, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, and the Bahamas, but today the Taíno line survives as part of mixed ethnicity.
the Arawakan language spoken by the early Taíno people.
a member of an American Indian people of the Greater Antilles and the Bahamas
the language of this people, belonging to the Arawakan family
First recorded in 1835–40; from Taíno: literally, “the noble, men of the good”
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The 65th was designated in 1920; its nickname, adopted during the Korean War, stems from Borikén, the Indigenous Taíno name for Puerto Rico.
From National Geographic ● Nov. 10, 2023
Carucci’s mother, a freestyle dancer raised in the Bronx, is Puerto Rican with Taíno and African ancestry.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 15, 2023
By 1514, however, only about thirty-two thousand Taíno remained.
From Textbooks ● Dec. 14, 2022
On the island of Hispaniola, for example, where both the Spanish and the French established sugar plantations, the native Taíno population was at least several hundred thousand strong when Columbus arrived in 1492.
From Textbooks ● Dec. 14, 2022
Vines, branches, and plants weave together into a thicket that is longer and thicker than the hull of the Taíno.
From "Kwame Crashes the Underworld" by Craig Kofi Farmer
Taino “Tai” Lopez was living proof the American dream was still attainable for young men willing to bet on themselves.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 10, 2026
In 2017, Garcia coordinated with Taino artist Tanya Melendez to turn the Columbus statue into an altar for the victims of Hurricane Maria.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 4, 2022
The apartment is located in the Taino Towers residential complex in Harlem.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 2, 2022
At one point on the fourth voyage, Columbus was able to cow some hostile Taino people by prophesying — courtesy of an almanac — an awe-inspiring lunar eclipse.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 12, 2019
“Mays” comes from the Spanish pronunciation of the Taino word for this crop: mahiz.
From "An Indigenous People’s History of the United States" by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
The Taínos of Guanahaní were among the thousands of tribes and nations who inhabited the continents of North and South America at the time of Columbus’s voyages.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 18, 2018
He regales his son with stories about the Taínos, the Incas and the Aztecs, but his cockamamie tales fail to capture his kid’s imagination.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 8, 2016
It illuminates tales from the Aztecs of Mexico, the Mayas of Guatemala, the Incas of Peru and the Taínos of Puerto Rico.
From New York Times ● May 26, 2016
Believing he had landed in the East Indies, Columbus called the native Taínos he found there “Indios,” giving rise to the term “Indian” for any native people of the New World.
From Textbooks ● Dec. 30, 2014
Its name, in fact, means flint, from the local stone the Taínos shaped into cutting utensils and arrows.
From New York Times ● Nov. 28, 2014
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
