CHINOOK • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Chinook

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noun

Chinook n.

(Ethnol.) One of a tribe of North American Indians now living in the state of Washington, noted for the custom of flattening their skulls. Chinooks also called Flathead Indians.

A warm westerly wind from the country of the Chinooks, sometimes experienced on the slope of the Rocky Mountains, in Montana and the adjacent territory.

A jargon of words from various languages (the largest proportion of which is from that of the Chinooks) generally understood by all the Indian tribes of the northwestern territories of the United States.

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Etymology of 'Chinook'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Chinook" Quotes from Famous Books

... war. It mattered not to him if everybody else was killed, so long as the property and families of his friends were safe. The conversation, of course, was carried on in the Chinook language, which is a mixture of the Wasco tongue ...

— Reminiscences of a Pioneer • Colonel William Thompson

... night at the Echeloot or Upper Chinook village, which they had visited when coming down the river. You will remember that it was there they first saw wooden houses made by Indians. The explorers were treated as hospitably as before, but, as you will also recall, the ...

— Deerfoot in The Mountains • Edward S. Ellis

... Hawaii and Florida and arctic in Alaska, semiarid in the great plains west of the Mississippi River and arid in the Great Basin of the southwest; low winter temperatures in the northwest are ameliorated occasionally in January and February by warm chinook winds from the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains Terrain: vast central plain, mountains in west, hills and low mountains in east; rugged mountains and broad river valleys in Alaska; rugged, volcanic topography in Hawaii Natural resources: coal, copper, lead, molybdenum, phosphates, uranium, bauxite, ...

— The 1993 CIA World Factbook • United States. Central Intelligence Agency.

... and stirred the fire, and the sparks and smoke whirled about them before a stinging blast. "I don't know," he said, glancing at a smear of whiteness that swept athwart the lake. "It depends upon the weather, and I'm not pleased with that to-night. You see the Chinook winds would keep off ...

— Alton of Somasco • Harold Bindloss

... morning after the chinook began to blow, Anson sprang to his feet from his bunk, and standing erect in the early morning light, ...

— A Little Norsk; Or, Ol' Pap's Flaxen • Hamlin Garland

Words linked to "Chinook" : Chinook Jargon, Oncorhynchus tshawytscha, king salmon, snow eater, Penutian, salmon, genus Oncorhynchus, wind, current of air