banyans

Noun

banyan (plural banyans)

1. An Indian trader, merchant, cashier, or money changer.
2. A tropical Indian fig tree, Ficus benghalensis, that has many aerial roots.
   • When doubling a point, which was covered with a heavy growth of the banian mangrove, which extended into deep water, we discovered a party of Kubu Orangs fishing from off a pack of drift that had lodged against the inward trend of the northern shore.1879, [R. Elton Smile [pseudonym; Elton Romeo Smilie]], “[Letter dated March 18th, 1878]”, in Investigations and Experience of M. Shawtinbach, at Saar Soong, Sumatra. […

   Synonyms:

   banyan tree

3. Various other trees of the Ficus subgenus Urostigma, especially Ficus pertusa (Central American banyan) and Ficus microcarpa (Chinese banyan or Malayan banyan).
4. A type of loose gown worn in India.
5. (India, Pakistan) A vest; an undershirt; a singlet.
   • It was an honest letter, written by an honest man, then stewing in the Plains on two hundred rupees a month (for he allowed his wife eight hundred and fifty), and in a silk banian and cotton trousers.1889, Rudyard Kipling, “At the Pit's Mouth”, in Under the Deodars, Boston: The Greenock Press, published 1899, page 50
6. (UK, dated, slang) A camping excursion on shore, to give a ship's crew a break from shipboard routine.

See all 7 meanings of banyan