bou·zou·ki  (b -z k ē, b ə-)
Share:
n. pl. bou·zou·kis A Greek stringed instrument having a long fretted neck and usually pear-shaped body.
[Modern Greek mpouzoúki, from Turkish bozuk (saz), a kind of saz (literally, "broken saz"), from bozuk, broken (probably in reference to bozuk düzen, broken tuning, a kind of reentrant tuning often used on the saz and bouzouki); akin to Old Turkic buzuk, destroyed, spoiled, from buzmaq, to destroy, spoil.]  (click for a larger image) bouzouki |
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition copyright ©2020 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
Indo-European & Semitic Roots Appendices
Thousands of entries in the dictionary include etymologies that trace their origins back to reconstructed proto-languages. You can obtain more information about these forms in our online appendices:
Indo-European Roots
Semitic Roots
The Indo-European appendix covers nearly half of the Indo-European roots that have left their mark on English words. A more complete treatment of Indo-European roots and the English words derived from them is available in our Dictionary of Indo-European Roots.
This website is best viewed in Chrome, Firefox, Microsoft Edge, or Safari. Some characters in pronunciations and etymologies cannot be displayed properly in Internet Explorer.