Chigoe

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /ˈt͡ʃɪ.ɡoʊ/

Definitions

1. A tiny parasitic insect that lives in the skin of mammals, causing irritation and inflammation while potentially leading to secondary infections
2. This small organism is known for burrowing into the skin of its hosts, resulting in discomfort, swelling, and the risk of complications such as infections
3. A very small flea that burrows beneath the skin of mammals, causing irritation and possible infection

Etymology: The chigoe is a flea, Tunga penetrans, whose fertilized females burrow into the skin and swell to the size of a pea, and the name's origin is genuinely unsettled. One candidate is a Cariban language of the Caribbean, where a term like "siko" may have been the source of the early form "chico." Another points to West Africa, where a word such as "jiga," meaning "insect," could have been carried across the Atlantic with enslaved people. Both routes are plausible, and neither has been proven. What can be traced with more confidence is the word's early appearance in print. The eighteenth-century historian Charlevoix wrote about the insect as "chique" in his 1730 history of Hispaniola, the island now shared by Haiti and the Dominican Republic. That spelling shows how the word was being recorded by European writers in the Caribbean at the time, well before it settled into its current form.

Synonyms: jigger, sand flea