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Theme weeks: words from Nahuatl, the central-Mexico language of the Aztecs.
coyote (kai-OH-tee, KAI-oht) - n., a North American wild dog (Canis latrans) with a slender build, bushy tail, and large ears.
The second pronunciation is used only in the western US, and is something of a regional shibboleth. It has adapted well to urban habitats, and its range has been expanding. (It's been a couple years since I've seen them in our neighborhood, but I'm not leaving the house as early in the morning as I once did.) Smaller than its close relative, the wolf, and regarded by Anglo-Americans as dangerous but less admirable, thus its reuse in slang senses of a contemptible person (including someone who smuggles immigrants across the border), though it's also used for forest-fire-fighters. In English, earlier form was cayote, from Mexican Spanish coyote, from Nahuatl coyōtl.
---L.
coyote (kai-OH-tee, KAI-oht) - n., a North American wild dog (Canis latrans) with a slender build, bushy tail, and large ears.
The second pronunciation is used only in the western US, and is something of a regional shibboleth. It has adapted well to urban habitats, and its range has been expanding. (It's been a couple years since I've seen them in our neighborhood, but I'm not leaving the house as early in the morning as I once did.) Smaller than its close relative, the wolf, and regarded by Anglo-Americans as dangerous but less admirable, thus its reuse in slang senses of a contemptible person (including someone who smuggles immigrants across the border), though it's also used for forest-fire-fighters. In English, earlier form was cayote, from Mexican Spanish coyote, from Nahuatl coyōtl.
---L.
