Word.ws English Dictionary

smoking ponies

smoking ponies phrase: the Native American practice of visiting other tribes in order to receive horses as gifts.

Phrase

smoking ponies

  1. (historical) The Native American practice of visiting other tribes in order to receive horses as gifts.
    • […] visiting other Indians and the State for the purpose of trading, smoking ponies, and begging, whichever seems best to accomplish the end in view — that is, getting a living without physical exertion.1885, United States. Bureau of Indian Affairs, Report, page 89
    • […] the Washitaws with their lovely squaws are on their way to visit the Delawares, who have a reservation not far north of Lawrence. This sort of visiting they call "smoking ponies."1953, The Kansas Magazine, page 89

Questions about smoking ponies

What does smoking ponies mean?
Smoking ponies means the Native American practice of visiting other tribes in order to receive horses as gifts.
What part of speech is smoking ponies?
Smoking ponies is a phrase.

Words near smoking ponies in the dictionary

  1. smoking one's pole
  2. smoking out
  3. smoking pipe
  4. smoking pipes
  5. smoking pole
  6. smoking ponies
  7. smoking room
  8. smoking rooms
  9. smoking someone's pole
  10. smoking stool syndrome
  11. smoking the whole pack

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: smoking ponies (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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