Chile Forum

This thread is for the foreign friends that, perhaps, would be interested in learn some of the Mapuche, Aymara and Quechua words we still use in Chile.

Pololo(a) = A small bug. It means boyfriend or girlfriend.
guagua = Quechua/Mapuche word for small baby.
chacra = Quechua word for a small farm land.
cancha = Quechua/Aymara word for field.
Chile (Chiri) = Quechua word for cold, freezing weather, the name given by Native peruvians to Chile, probably because the mountain weather.
Cachantun = Mapuche brand name of a mineral bottled water, that means "beautiful skin"
Pichintun = Mapuche a little bit.
guata = Mapuche belly
cahuin = Mapuche mess
malon = Mapuche party
piriguin = baby fish
curanto = cura-antu (stone shining like a sun) Chiloe dish cooked in a stone hole.
Vichuquen = Vicu-lafken (lake that has the shape of a serpent)
Huinca = Robber... name given by the Mapuches to non-Mapuche chileans.
Huincha = band (head band, ribbon)

pinguin wrote:This thread is for the foreign friends that, perhaps, would be interested in learn some of the Mapuche, Aymara and Quechua words we still use in Chile.)

Pa que no olvidemos la más importante.... la palta

Pilgua= Carry bag/ those large, reusable plastic bags you designate for potatoes, vegetables, etc.

Y pampa, voz Quechua. Hasta los estadounidences saben más o menos qué es la pampa.

Copiapó - del quechua kópa-yápu, que significa lugar donde los mineros gozan de buena suerte... no, miento.... significa ‘sementera de turquesas’. Derivación: de copay, voz quechua: color azul claro, y yapu: tierra arada (Copa-yapu).

Chañaral - viene de chañar, voz quechua, que quiere decir "La wikipedia toma el pelo cuando dice Chañaral es una de las ciudades de mayores atractivos turísticos en Chile.

guanaco from the quechua term "wanaku" which means "green water-cannon conveyance employed by Carabineros to break up demonstrations." Also refers to a New World camelid animal, Lama guanicoe. Frequently described by undereducated and overcompensated travel writers as a llama, when it appears that quite the reverse is true.

Guanacos are known down here in El Verdadero Sur for their tendencies to spit wads of semi-digested vegetable matter at plate-glass windows after the animals recognise their reflections in the glass. On certain mornings, on seeing myself in the mirror, I have reason to understand this spitting reflex.

Up until about 1800, the New World camelids (alpaca, llama, guanaco, and vicuña) were for the purposes of scientific classification grouped with Old World dromedaries and Bactrians (genus Camelus). Subsequent to 1800, despite objections from the geocentrists of the Vaticano, alpacas, llamas, guanacos and vicuñas gained their own genus: Lama. But a short time later, vicuñas were recognised as sufficiently different and thus were placed in genus Vicugna. Then in 2001 DNA research on alpacas indicated that they descended from vicuñas and not proto-guanacos, so now they have moved over to genus Vicugna. One of the theories surrounding genus Lama is that a larger precursor guanaco is the ancestral version and present-day llamas are descendants of ancestral guanacos. Precursor guanacos have been seen in remains dating to the Holocene, 8000-5000 or so years ago.

Guanacos range in significant numbers from Bolivia to Tierra del Fuego. Extremist animal-protection organisations falsely claim that they have been hunted to the point of extinction and deserve special status. People who actually live with guanacos and the government agencies charged with their management take a more realistic viewpoint. Their numbers are in fact quite large (probably over 1,000,000 just in Chile and Argentina) and in Tierra del Fuego the Chilean government has approved the harvesting of guanacos to keep the herds in check. In fact, driving across the plains and matorral of south-central Tierra del Fuego can be downright hazardous at times due to herds of guanacos running willy-nilly back and forth across the roads. Tierra del Fuego is a bit of a special case because the guanaco's only natural enemy, the puma, is absent in Tierra del Fuego.

Keep it up please it's interesting to see that some of the words I assumed were standard Spanish are imports from South American languages. Most of them seem to be understood in other countries, though "polola" always gets raised eyebrows

FrankPintor wrote:Keep it up please :

OK, then on to llamas, since we discussed their ancestral guanacos.

Whereas in castellano llamas as a noun means "flames, " in the Andes of course llamas are critters. Llama is another fine Quechua word, but in the north of Chile the Aymaras have their own term: qawra.

And the word "alpaca" supposedly comes from the Aymara term, allpaca

carpa -- you thought it was a Spanish word meaning "tent." It's another Quechua word, from the original carppa, or karpa. Some Quechua words ended up getting sent back to Spain in the 16th and 17th centuries and became recognised by the Real Academia de la Lengua Española. In addition, though the Quechua term (carpa/karpa) was first used in parts of South America having contact with Inca-influenced groups, the Spanish colonists spread the term further, and in Mexican parlance the term carpa became associated with "under the big-top theatrical performances."

Not long ago I saw an add that reads: "Pullman bus Melipilla".... A curious mixed phrase. Pullman is the last name from an American that developed confortable railroad wagons and it is used as a synonym of luxury transport. Bus, in Spanish is autobus. And Melipilla, well, Melipilla is a Mapuche word that means four volcanos or four spirits... Meli=four, Pillan=Volcano, powerfull spirit, wizard... So, in a single phrase you have English, Spanish and Mapudungun.
Central Chile before contact was a multiethnic area, settled by Northern Mapuches (Picunches), by Diaguitas and other northerner peoples, and ruled by an Inca elite. Central Chile Mapuche was the language of choice, a variation of Mapuche.

Some Mapuche words in Central Chile.

Santiago's hills:
Santa Lucia, Huelen (Pain, melancoly, sadness) named after the chief Huelen Huala, who ruled the sector.
San Cristobal, Tupahue (place of tupas, a plant that grew on the hill)

Apumanque, name of a chief, means flowers of the condors.
Manquehue, place of condors
Vitacura, Butacura, big stone, probable because the large stones on the river.
Mapocho, means Mapuche river, river of the Mapuche people. By the way, Mapuche means Mapu=land, Che=people, the people of this land or local peoples.
Talagante, hunging rope of the wizard... Talagante, even today, is famous for its mythical witches...
Aconcagua, according to some theory, comes from the Quechua Ackon Cabuak, that means "Stone sentinel"
Nuñoa, from Ñuñowe, place of ñuños.
Los Vilos, from Vilu, Filu, serpernt. It means the serpents.
Pudahuel, in the lake.
Maipu, cultivated land
Lonquen, lowland
Quilicura, red stone.
Curico, black river. Curiosily in Curicó there are some Spanish topinimics that say the same, like the place called "Aguas Negras"
Talca, from Tralca (Thunder)
Tobalaba, cemetery

That's for now.


Well, that's just

patagoniax wrote:carpa -- you thought it was a Spanish word meaning "tent." It's another Quechua word, from the original carppa, or karpa. ...

Very interesting. I didn't know it.
You made me remember another Quechua word Chompa. As you know, in coloquial Spanish a "Chomba" is a Sweeter.