Niger
UK /ˈnaɪ.d͡ʒə(ɹ)/ · US /ˈnaɪ.d͡ʒɚ/ proper noun, noun
Forms the Niger
- proper noun A country in West Africa, situated to the north of Nigeria. Official name: Republic of the Niger.
- proper noun A major river in West Africa that flows into the Gulf of Guinea in Nigeria.
- proper noun A state of Nigeria in the North Central geopolitical zone. Capital and largest city: Minna.
- noun An Ethiopian herb (Guizotia abyssinica), grown for its seed and edible oil.
Synonyms
Etymology
Borrowed from French Niger. For further etymology, commonly linked by folk etymology to Latin niger (“black”), which likely influenced the modern spelling.
Some sources give the term to Tuareg roots, deriving it from a claimed gher n-gheren or egereou n-igereouen (“river of rivers”). Compare Tarifit iɣzar-n-iɣezran.
Older sources derive Niger, via a series of mistranslations and geographic misplacements by Greek, Roman and Arab geographers, from Ptolemy's descriptions of the wadi Gir (in modern Algeria) and the "Lower Gir" (or "Ni-Gir") to the south.
From the name of the Niger River, from Latin Nigris. See further etymology at Niger.
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 — from the Wiktionary entry “Niger”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details