bayou

noun

bay·​ou ˈbī-(ˌ)ü How to pronounce bayou (audio)
-(ˌ)ō
Synonyms of bayounext
1
: a creek, secondary watercourse, or minor river that is tributary to another body of water
2
: any of various usually marshy or sluggish bodies of water

Synonyms

See all Synonyms & Antonyms in Thesaurus 

Examples of bayou in a Sentence

a small creek that is the bayou of a larger stream
Recent Examples on the Web Adleman had been brutally beaten and strangled with her own shoelace in a heavily wooded area off a jogging trail along a bayou, police said. —Democrat-Gazette Staff From Wire Reports, arkansasonline.com, 8 Aug. 2024 Arthur Lee Burton had been sentenced to death for the July 1997 killing of Nancy Adleman, a 48-year-old mother of three who police found beaten and strangled with her own shoelace in a wooded area off a jogging trail along a bayou. —CBS News, 8 Aug. 2024 Tiana’s Bayou Adventure Following the opening of the east coast version, Disneyland Park will be goin’ down the bayou come Nov.15,, 2024 when Tiana’s Bayou Adventure officially opens. —Carly Caramanna, Travel + Leisure, 12 Aug. 2024 Melissa Martin down in the bayou of just generations deep of cooking from the Bayou. —Cnt Editors, Condé Nast Traveler, 18 July 2024 See all Example Sentences for bayou 

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'bayou.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Etymology

borrowed from Louisiana French, earlier bayouque, perhaps borrowed from early Choctaw *bayok, whence Choctaw bo·k "creek, river"

Note: A Choctaw source for the word has been claimed since Albert Gatschet, A Migration Legend of the Creek Indians, vol. 1 (Philadelphia, 1884), p. 113 (" … the Cha'hta word for a smaller river, or river forming part of a delta, is báyuk, contraction bōk, and occurs in Boguechito, Bok'humma, etc."). However, bayuk is apparently not attested in 19th/20th century Choctaw, and the notion that Choctaw bo·k, "creek, river," is a contraction of bayuk is simply Gatschet's conjecture. The earliest attestation of the word is apparently in the memoirs of the French carpenter André Pénicaut, writing in 1723: "A cinq lieues plus loin, en tournant tousjours à la gauche sur le lac, on trouve une eau dormante, que les Sauvages appellent Bayouque" - "Five leagues farther, always turning to the left along the lake shore, one comes to a stagnant body of water that the Indians call bayouque"; see Pierre Margry, editor, Découvertes et Établissements des Français dans l'Ouest et dans le Sud de l'Amérique Septentrionale (1614-1754): Mémoires et Documents Originaux, 5. partie (Paris, 1887), p. 385 (translated by Richebourg McWilliams in Fleur de Lys and Calumet, Being the Pénicaut Narrative of French Adventure in Louisiana, University of Alabama Press, 1981 [1953]). It should be noted that Pénicaut, who was resident in Louisiana from 1699 to 1721, was not the most reliable recorder of what the local Indians actually spoke: he also avers that maringouin "mosquito, gnat" and sagamité "stew or soup made with hominy" are the words used for these things by the local Indians, though both are in fact imports into North American French from other parts of the New World (Margry, op. cit., pp. 384, 386). However insecure the Choctaw etymology of bayouque, it is accepted in volume 14 ("Southeast") of the Handbook of North American Indians (Smithsonian Institution, 2004), according to which the ethnic name Bayacchyto (recorded in 1699 by Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville) "seems to be early Choctaw *bayok-čítoʔ 'big bayou' … which in its later form bo·k-čítoʔ is preserved in the name of Bogue Chitto, a tributary of the Pearl River … " (p. 175).

First Known Use

1763, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Time Traveler
The first known use of bayou was in 1763

Dictionary Entries Near bayou

bayott

bayou

bayou bass

See More Nearby Entries 

Cite this Entry

“Bayou.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bayou. Accessed 8 Oct. 2024.

Copy Citation

Share

Kids Definition

bayou

noun
bay·​ou ˈbī-ō How to pronounce bayou (audio)
ˈbī-ü
: a marshy or slowly flowing body of water (as a stream or inlet)

More from Merriam-Webster on bayou

Nglish: Translation of bayou for Spanish Speakers

Last Updated: - Updated example sentences
Love words? Need even more definitions?

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!

Popular in Grammar & Usage

See All

Plural and Possessive Names: A Guide

Every Letter Is Silent, Sometimes: A-Z List of Examples

The Difference Between 'i.e.' and 'e.g.'

What's the difference between 'fascism' and 'socialism'?

More Commonly Misspelled Words
See All

Popular in Wordplay

See All

Weird Words for Autumn Time

8 Words with Fascinating Histories

8 Words for Lesser-Known Musical Instruments

Birds Say the Darndest Things

10 Words from Taylor Swift Songs (Merriam's Version)
See All

Games & Quizzes

See All
Play Quordle: Guess all four words in a limited number of tries. Each of your guesses must be a real 5-letter word.
Quordle Can you solve 4 words at once?
Play Blossom: Solve today's spelling word game by finding as many words as you can using just 7 letters. Longer words score more points.
Blossom Word Game Pick the best words!
Play Missing Letter: a crossword with a twist. Each of the 25 puzzle words start with a different letter of the alphabet. Which letter is missing?
Missing Letter A daily crossword with a twist
petit-fours
Name That Dessert! Hope you’ve saved room for some sweet vocabulary.