Marabout
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A Muslim holy man or mystic, especially in parts of North Africa.
"one of their principal targets was the marabouts – or holy men and leaders of mystic orders – whom they accused both of corrupting the faith by their espousal of mysticism and of being the ‘domestic animals of colonialism’."
- 2 large African black-and-white carrion-eating stork; its downy underwing feathers are used to trim garments wordnet
- 3 The tomb or shrine of such a person.
"Climbing one on his second day lost, Prosperi spotted a disturbance to the view. “I was convinced it was somebody’s home or a holy man’s shrine.” But the shrine, or marabout, was empty. The only holy man was in a sarcophagus."
- 4 Alternative form of marabou (“thin fabric made from silk”). alt-of, alternative
"Wherever she went she had, if not the finest, at any rate the most showy gown in the room; her ornaments were the biggest; her hats, toques, berets, marabouts, and other fallals, always the most conspicuous."
Example
More examples"Kabyle weaving, Marabout reputation."
Etymology
From French marabout, from Portuguese maraboto, marabuto, from Moroccan Arabic مْرَابِط (mrabeṭ) (standard Arabic مُرَابِط (murābiṭ, “soldier stationed in fortified outpost”)).
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.