Gorillai
Gorillai proper noun: a tribe of hairy women described by Hanno the Navigator.
Proper noun
Gorillai
- A tribe of hairy women described by Hanno the Navigator.
- Mr D. cenſures Voſſius for imagining that the Gorgons and Gorillæ had any reference to each other; and obſerves, that it was not the Greeks, nor even the Carthaginian Hanno himſelf, who gave them this appellation, but the interpreters, whom they had procured from the Lixitæ; and that it is...1797, Thomas Falconer, “Dissertation II.”, in The Voyage of Hanno: […], London, page 41
- Proceeding to the chapter which treats of the ‘traditions reſpecting the iſands of the Atlantic,’ adjacent to the coaſts juſt examined, we may remark, that, at the extremity of Hanno’s expedition, he mentions the Gorillæ, and tells us, that he chiefly ſaw females, who fought with fury; that he...1799, The Critical Review; or, Annals of Literature, London, page 488
Examples of Gorillai in a sentence
- It is not necessary to suppose that the “Gorillai” were really Gorillas; in fact, they were probably dog-faced baboons, which, when attacked, do sometimes throw stones at their attackers.1931, Richmond Palmer, The Carthaginian Voyage to West Africa in 500 B. C.: Together with Sultan Mohammed Bello's Account of The Origin of...
- At this point the expedition had an unfortunate encounter with the wild group called the Gorillai.⁶⁰2005, The Ancient World Society, The Ancient World, page 122:
- the word gorilla (large ape) comes from the discovery by Greeks of a hairy tribe of West African island women called Gorillai2007, Barbara Ann Kipfer, Word Nerd: More Than 17,000 Fascinating Facts about Words, Sourcebooks, →ISBN, page 243:
Forms of Gorillai
| alternative form | Gorillae |
|---|---|
| alternative form (obsolete) | Gorillæ |
| alternative form (obsolete) | gorillæ |
Origin of Gorillai
From Ancient Greek Γόριλλαι (Górillai, “Gorillai”). Doublet of gorilla.
Questions about Gorillai
- What does Gorillai mean?
- Gorillai means a tribe of hairy women described by Hanno the Navigator.
- How do you use Gorillai in a sentence?
- It is not necessary to suppose that the “Gorillai” were really Gorillas; in fact, they were probably dog-faced baboons, which, when attacked, do sometimes throw stones at their attackers.
- What part of speech is Gorillai?
- Gorillai is a proper noun.
Words near Gorillai in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: Gorillai (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Cite this entry: “Gorillai.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/gorillai. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.