Pitcairn

Part of speech: noun, adjective

Definitions

1. A remote British overseas territory in the South Pacific Ocean, settled by descendants of mutineers from HMS Bounty
2. The isolated British island group in the South Pacific, best known as the refuge of the Bounty mutineers and their descendants
3. A tiny, far-flung British dependency in the middle of the South Pacific, famous for its mutineer ancestry and small population

Etymology: Robert Pitcairn was a young naval midshipman who, while serving aboard a British ship exploring the South Pacific, became the first European to sight an uninhabited speck of volcanic rock that now bears his name. The island was named in his honour, and the name later spread to the wider group of islands it belongs to. Its later history gives the name its human dimension: in the decades after the sighting, mutineers from HMS Bounty settled there, and their descendants live on the island today.