Mango

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /ˈmæŋɡəʊ/

Definitions

1. A tropical fruit with smooth skin that is typically yellow, orange, or red when ripe, containing a large pit and sweet, juicy flesh
2. A type of tropical fruit recognized for its sweet, tender flesh and colorful skin, which can range from green to yellow or red, containing a large pit inside
3. A sweet, fleshy fruit from a tropical tree, usually characterized by its vibrant skin colors ranging from green to red, and it features a large seed at its center

Etymology: The fruit's English name arrived by way of Portuguese traders on the Malabar coast of southwest India. Portuguese "manga" was borrowed from Malayalam "māṅṅa" or Tamil "māṅkāy", and the word goes back to a Proto-South Dravidian compound meaning "unripe mango," built from "mām" (the mango tree) and "kāy" (unripe fruit). The English word was first recorded for the fruit in the 1580s, and for the tree by the 1670s. The name thus began as a word for the unripe fruit before it came to mean the ripe one, a reminder that the Dravidian languages distinguished the fruit by its stage of ripeness. Where the final "-o" came from is not certain, and it may have been added under Portuguese or Malay influence.

Synonyms: fruit, stone fruit, tropical fruit, sweet fruit, exotic fruit