CHILEAN TERMS
Aji: small red peppers, highly aromatic, grown in the northerly regions; used extensively in Chilean cooking.
Alerce: a tall conifer of South Chile; fine lumber.Alerzal, a wood ofalercetrees.
Algarroba: the sweet pod of the minosa-like Algarrobo tree (North).
Algarrobo: (al carob, Arabic), term applied by Spanish to small thorny tree bearing pods used as cattle fodder (North).
Antofagastino: native of Antofagasta.
Arenal: sand desert, sand-laden wind.
Atacameño: native of Atacama.
Avellano: small tree (Central and South) yielding the avellana, a soft-shelled nut resembling the hazel.
Bolas: throwing weapon used by mounted cattlemen or hunters; long pliable rope or hide thong with heavy weights at either end, flung in such a manner that it enwraps and twists about the legs of the animal pursued.
Boldo: a small tree yielding the drugboldaina.
Boquete: a mountain pass.
Brasero: deep dish or bowl, usually made of copper or silver, filled with charcoal and heated for cooking purposes or to warm a room.
Butre: smallest wild bamboo.
Cajón: a gap in the high mountains.
Caliche: strata containing nitrate of soda.
Camanchaca: fog or mist over the northern plains.
Cancha: depot (for ores, North); gun-park; tennis-court.
Candeal: hard brown wheat of the southerly provinces.
Canelo: sweet-smelling small tree (Central Chile), the “South American cinnamon.”
Capacho: bag used for carrying ore, made of hide.
Capataz: foreman of workers.
Carbonado: a Chilean soup.
Cardón: applied to various thistles and especially to the big blue-floweredCynara cardunculus, growing through Central and South Chile, but the term is also used for many spiny plants and leaves, for the wild artichoke and the thorny leaves of the Puya.
Cateo: the search for a mine.
Cazuela: thick stew, made with chicken, rice, potatos, aji, etc.
Chacolí: country wine, lightly fermented.
Chacra: a small cultivated plot of land.
Chagual: applied generally toPuya chilensisorPuya coarctata, growing freely from the sea-border to Andean slopes in all Central Chile: the tall spike of blue, or in other varieties yellow flowers is the “chagual,” while the spiny leaf is called “cardón” and the big thorns used as knitting-needles; the flowers are gathered for their honey.
Chaucha: twenty centavo piece.
Chañar: small tree (North), yielding date-like fruit.Chañaral, group of chañar trees.
Charqui: dried meat (“jerked” beef).
Charquican: Chilean dish made with charqui.
Chicha: heavy liquor made from grapes or apples; formerly made from wild berries by Indians of Chile.
Chileno(a): native of Chile.
Chillehueque: Araucanian name for the Guanaco.
Chilote: native of Chiloé.
Chinchilla: small fur-bearing rodent, today scarce and valuable.
Chingana: wattled booths set up at fairs for the assembly of musicians and dancers.
Choapino: saddle-cloth, woven of thick black-dyed wool (South).
Choclo: maize.
Cholo: a Peruvian. Cf.Godo, a Spaniard;Gabacho, Frenchman.
Chonta: palm growing on Más a Tierra island (Juan Fernandez group), yielding a fine wood of which walking sticks and canes are made, prized for the bright yellow and black pattern of the wood. The young head of the palm is cooked and eaten as a “cabbage.”
Choros: large mussels found off Chilean coast, eaten in great quantities.
Chuño: arrowroot; or frozen and dried potatoes.
Chuso: a stupid fellow.
Cochayuyo: sea-weed, stewed in the south for soup, likeluche.
Coihue,Coigüe: large tree (South), yielding hardwood and a red dye.
Colihue: wild bamboo.Colihual, bamboo thicket.
Condor: giant vulture (Sarcoramphus) of the Andes, ringed with white about the neck. Appears on Chilean coat-of-arms together with the native deerhuemul. Araucanian name,manqui.
Congrio: a Chilean fish, generally liked; as also is thecorbina,robaloand delicatepejerey.
Copihue: wild vine with a large, rosy bell. The national flower of Chile.
Coquimbano(a): native of Coquimbo.
Cueca: a popular soup.
Cueca, orsama-cueca: the Chilean national dance.
Culén(Cytisus Arboreus): prophylactic against witchcraft: leaves dried to make a medicinal tea and gum from stalks; well known as a vermifuge.
Cupilca: thick liquid or thin paste made with toasted and powdered wheat or maize and mixed with chicha or chacolí.
Curado: “half seas over.”
Curanto: Indian dish of meat and vegetables, originally cooked in a stone-lined hole in the ground.
Cuyano: a native of the Argentine. Properly, applied to one born in the old province of Cuyo, formerly including the then Chilean provinces of Mendoza, San Juan and San Luis, but used familiarly of any one born in Argentina.
Despacho: shop or store on an estate or mine where goods are sold to employés.
Empanada: a paté, filled with chopped meat, onions, gravy, etc., and served hot.
Estrada: raised bench generally built across the end of a living room, used in colonial days as a seat for all the ladies of the family.
Fernandecino(a): native of the Juan Fernandez group of islands.
Floripondio: large white pendant flowers of theDatura arborea, growing as a fairly large tree in Chile. Infusions yield thehuanto, a drugging drink used in regions of Quechua influence by witch-doctors to obtain insensibility and visions;huantois similar in effect to thenatemaof Amazonian headwaters;caapiof Eastern Ecuador, andayahuascaof Peru.
Fundo: a general farm.Fundo de rulo, a non-irrigated farm.
Futre: a pretentious person; in copper mines, a ghost or imp.
Garúa: fine rain, like a “Scotch mist” (North).
Guachuchero: a liquor-smuggler (mining regions).
Guagua: a baby (Araucanian Indian).
Guaira,guairachina: little smelters built on hilltop to catch the breeze.
Gualcacho: (Araucanian) plant yielding a small native grain similar to but more delicate than maize.
Gualhue: (Araucanian) damp ground, usually near a river, suitable for maize cultivation.
Guanaco: ruminant quadruped, still found in considerable numbers in the wild mountainous regions, all the way from the Bolivian border to Tierra del Fuego. Rugs and coverings made of the thick tawny hair, and the flesh eaten by Indians. In Ch. slang, a “guanaco” is a country bumpkin, a “hayseed.”
Guaso,huaso: a cowboy (Central Chile).
Guemul,huemul: the native deer of Chilean woodland.
Hacer-se Sueco: to be unintelligible.
Huacho: properly, a motherless calf, but applied to any waif.
Huasca: a whip: originally applied to a supple creeper or liana of the forests, used as a cord or thong.
Humita: maize paste.
Inquilino: farm-worker on a Chilean estate, on special conditions. Usually given free house, land for cultivation, rations, small wages, and use of implements.
Invernado: wintering-place for cattle.
Litre: a tree used for fuel. Leaves poisonous, affecting persons in the tree’s shade.
Llareta(Lareta acaulis): umbelliferous plant of low growth, spreading to an enormous size like a giant mushroom: grows in uplands of Tacna and Antofagasta, and is cut, dried on lower slopes, and brought down to inhabited regions to serve as fuel.
Luche: sea-weed used for making stews.
Lumo: a large tree supplying good timber.
Machí: medicine-woman of the Araucanians.
Maitén: tree with white wood. Leaves infused to obtain a febrifuge.
Mampato: the small Chilean pony.
Manco: properly, a one-armed man, but applied to broken-down horses.
Manta: a finely-woven poncho, often of alpaca or vicuña wool.Manto, black shawl worn by women when attending church services.
Mineral: a mineral reef or group of mines.
Molle: small tree with sweet-scented flowers and medicinal berries, formerly used by Indians for making chicha.
Paco: slang term for a policeman.
Palqui: plant yielding mauve or yellow flowers: ashes used in soap-making.
Pampa: a plain.Pampas salitreras, nitrate fields.
PanquiorPangui(Gunnera peltata): plant with large rhubarb-like leaves, yielding a black dye and tannin. Grows in great quantities upon the islands of Juan Fernandez.Pangal, a mass of Pangui plants.
Penquisto: native of Penco: applied to inhabitants of Concepción City, the former Penco, or of Concepción province.
Pirquén: system by which the miner (pirquenero) works a vein on his own account, paying a royalty on production.
Politiquero: a professional politician: used derogatively.
Porotos: beans.
Porteño: native of “the port”: usually, of Valparaiso.
Pudu: the miniature deer of South Chile.
Pulpería: store at a mine or nitrate oficina.
Puno: mountain sickness due to rarefied air: more commonly calledsorochein Peru and Bolivia.
Puntarrense: native of Punta Arenas.
Puya(Puya chilensis, formerly listed as Pourretia coarctata): group of plants common in Chile, belonging to the genus Bromeliacrae, different varieties bearing light or dark blue or yellow flowers arranged in a huge spike; large orange stamens. The spiny leaves form a thick rosette at the base, in a form similar to that of the related pineapple. Feature of landscape in Central Chile, on spurs of hills. The light pith of the mature stem of the tall flower-spike, more buoyant than cork, is used for fishing floats and for sharpening razors.
Quelghen: the Chilean native strawberry, remains white when ripe, very sweet.
Quila: the small climbing bamboo of the South.
Quillay: a tree yielding a saponaceous bark much used in Chile.
Quintral: a beautiful scarlet-blossomed parasite upon poplar and other trees.
Quisco(Cereus quisco): columnar cactus of Central and northerly Chile, called “torch thistle”; thorns used as needles; grows 12 to 18 ft.
Raule: a fine timber tree with red wood.
Robie: properly, oak, but applied to the Chilean beeches (South).
Roto: a “ragged man,” originally: now applied to any worker.
Salitre: nitrate of soda.
Santiaguino(a): native of Santiago.
Siutico: “low-class” person; same meaning asmediopelo.
Soroche: SeePuno.
Tajamar: wall or bank built to restrain the flood of sea or river; that of the Mapocho river a famous promenade in Santiago.
Templados: people in love; same meaning asencamotados.
Ulmo: drink made of parched and ground corn or maize (Indian).
Valdiviano: a native of Valdivia; also name of a vegetable soup.
Ventisqueros: glaciers; frequently driven by wind into frozen snow pinnacles, commonly called in Chile “nieves penitentes.”
Williwaw: a squall in Magellanic territory (Scots).
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTESPageChanged fromChanged to59the Spaniards troubling that region given up. Thethe Spaniards troubling that region gave up. The105became Lady Calcroft and published a perenniallybecame Lady Callcott and published a perennially187Work on the Portrerillos installation was suspendedWork on the Potrerillos installation was suspended213Chiléo’s 134 inches; the genial softness of the climateChiloé’s 134 inches; the genial softness of the climate221The evergreen beech (Fagus antarticus) flourishes inThe evergreen beech (Fagus antarcticus) flourishes inTypos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained.Used numbers for footnotes.
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