banyan
Syllabification: (ban·yan)
Pronunciation: /ˈbanyən/
(also banian)
Definition of banyan
noun
(also banyan tree)Origin:
late 16th century: from Portuguese, from Gujarati vāṇiyo 'man of the trading caste', from Sanskrit. Originally denoting a Hindu trader or merchant, the term was applied by Europeans in the mid 17th century to a particular tree under which such traders had built a pagoda
