Word.ws English Dictionary

precolonial

precolonial adjective: of or pertaining to a historical period before colonization.

Adjective

precolonial (not comparable)

  1. Of or pertaining to a historical period before colonization.

Noun

precolonial (plural precolonials)

  1. An inhabitant of an area before colonists first arrived.
    • After 1970 one no longer expected to find Tio whose parents had experienced the precolonial period, except for a few very old persons. Most people now were grandchildren of the precolonials.1990, Jan M. Vansina, Paths in the Rainforests
    • However, archaeological evidence also points to the likelihood of “direct jumps” by Saladoid migrants from South America to the northern Caribbean. It is easy to understand why these early precolonials were engaged in island-hopping.2009, Basil A. Reid, Myths and Realities of Caribbean History, page 100

Forms of precolonial

pluralprecolonials

Origin of precolonial

From pre- + colonial.

Words formed from precolonial

Questions about precolonial

What does precolonial mean?
Precolonial means of or pertaining to a historical period before colonization.
What part of speech is precolonial?
Precolonial can be an adjective or a noun.

Words near precolonial in the dictionary

  1. precollegiate
  2. precollicular
  3. precollision
  4. precollisional
  5. precollusion
  6. precolonial
  7. precolonialism
  8. precoloniality
  9. precolonially
  10. precolonials
  11. precolonized

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: precolonial (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.

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Cite this entry: “precolonial.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/precolonial. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.