siwash

[ sahy-wosh, -wawsh ]

noun
  1. (sometimes initial capital letter)Disparaging and Offensive. a contemptuous term used to refer to a North American Indian.

verb (used without object)
  1. to camp out without a tent or supplies.

Origin of siwash

1
1830–40; <Chinook Jargon <North American French sauvage Indian, French: wild, savage

Words Nearby siwash

Other definitions for Siwash (2 of 2)

Siwash
[ sahy-wosh, -wawsh ]

noun
  1. a conventional designation for any small, provincial college or for such colleges collectively (often preceded by old): students from old Siwash.

Origin of Siwash

2
After a fictional college of the same name in At Good Old Siwash (1911) and other books by U.S. author George Helgeson Fitch (1877–1915)

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

How to use siwash in a sentence

  • He glanced down the river and saw a long siwash dugout sweep around the curve of the Big Bend.

    The Hidden Places | Bertrand W. Sinclair
  • I guess siwash, for example, is a French word—probably it was originally sauvage, meaning savage.

    Jack the Young Canoeman | George Bird Grinnell
  • Like the ancient Greeks, the siwash of the Northwest invest the unseen world with spiritual intelligence.

  • As for the siwash village on the other side of Sitka, it is a siwash village over again.

    Over the Rocky Mountains to Alaska | Charles Warren Stoddard
  • But when a siwash quits eating fish it is generally because there is no more fish to eat.

    Cruisings in the Cascades | George O. Shields

British Dictionary definitions for siwash (1 of 2)

siwash

/ (ˈsaɪwɒʃ) /


noun
  1. another name for Cowichan sweater

verb
  1. (intr) (in the Pacific Northwest) to camp out with only natural shelter

Origin of siwash

1
see Siwash

British Dictionary definitions for Siwash (2 of 2)

Siwash

/ (ˈsaɪwɒʃ) sometimes not capital slang, derogatory (in the Pacific Northwest) /


noun
  1. a North American Indian

adjective
  1. of, characteristic of, or relating to Indians

  2. worthless, stingy, or bad: he's siwash

Origin of Siwash

2
C19: from Chinook Jargon, from French sauvage savage

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012