toa

toa noun: a small painted artifact made by the Diyari people of Australia, believed to have been used as place markers or signposts.

Noun (1)

toa (plural toas)

A small painted artifact made by the Diyari people of Australia, believed to have been used as place markers or signposts.
- These thirty-four toa constructions, made from urban debris and ceremoniously installed in a circular (or sometimes oval) bed of sand, bring together the multiple themes centred on reclamation that preoccupied his life.2000, Lin Onus, Urban dingo: the art and life of Lin Onus, 1948-1996, page 21
- It seems that on leaving one place people would place a toa in the ground to show other people where they had gone.2005, Bill Arthur, Macquarie Atlas of Indigenous Australia, page 22

toa (plural toas)

(New Zealand) A brave warrior.
- The toa or brave who distinguished himself was thought very highly of.1902, Journal of the Polynesian Society, volume 11, page 211
- Thus in Polynesia, the toa (warrior) could challenge the ariki (priest/chief).2011, Robert N. Bellah, Religion in Human Evolution, page 261

toa (countable and uncountable, plural toas)

A Polynesian tree of the genus Casuarina, or its wood.
- It happens that nature has assembled in this spot, not only the wildest profusion of the vegetable kingdom, over which the lofty toa tree stands pre-eminent, but also objects of another description, overhanging rocks, hollow-sounding caverns, and steep precipices, calculated to give an aspect as...1817, William Mariner, An Account of the Natives of the Tonga Islands in the South Pacific, page 302
- The toa wood of the South Pacific islands is similar to Eastern walnut in color and texture, but is much finer in figure.1882, John Shertzer Hittell, The Commerce and Industries of the Pacific Coast of North America, page 604

plural	toas

Borrowed from Dieri toa (“sign, mark, stick, messenger”), thoa, thuwa.

Borrowed from Māori toa.

Borrowed from Māori toa. Doublet of koa.

What does toa mean?: Toa means a small painted artifact made by the Diyari people of Australia, believed to have been used as place markers or signposts.
What part of speech is toa?: Toa is a noun.
What is the plural of toa?: The plural of toa is toas.

Adapted from Wiktionary: toa (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: 2026-09-02

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