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
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
By 1514, however, only about thirty-two thousand Taíno remained.
From Textbooks ● Dec. 14, 2022
Sergio tells us that the Taíno were the indigenous population on the island.
From "Marcus Vega Doesn't Speak Spanish" by Pablo Cartaya
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
When Columbus visited the bay on his second voyage in 1494, he was met by indigenous Tainos; though he named the bay Puerto Grande, its Taino name of Guantanamo stuck.
From Washington Post ● Jul. 10, 2017
“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
For the Taínos as well as the Spanish, therefore, the encounter on that fateful October morning was the beginning of a very new world.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 18, 2018
Neither the Taínos nor their visitors could know it, but their exchange of gifts that morning launched the beginning of a long interaction between the peoples of Europe and the Western Hemisphere.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 18, 2018
We are a people, the Arawaks and Taínos might have said, even as they died trying to prove it.
From New York Times ● Nov. 6, 2017
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
There, we visited Corral de los Indios, a clearing, ringed with stones, where the Taínos once held their rituals.
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.
