Caique
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A small wooden trading vessel, brightly painted and rigged for sail, traditionally used for fishing and trawling.
"Shipping of every sort, from passenger liners to ferry steamers, tramps to tugs and trailing barges, feluccas to speedboats and yachts, from warships to caiques, chugs, hoots, glides or churns its way in all directions."
- 2 Any of four (previously two) species of parrot in the genus Pionites.
Example
More examples"Shipping of every sort, from passenger liners to ferry steamers, tramps to tugs and trailing barges, feluccas to speedboats and yachts, from warships to caiques, chugs, hoots, glides or churns its way in all directions."
Etymology
Borrowed from French caïque, from Italian caicco, from Ottoman Turkish قایق (kayık), from Proto-Turkic *kiayguk (“boat, oar”). Cognate with modern Turkish kayık.
From Spanish caíque or Portuguese caíque.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.