Pawnee

noun

Paw·​nee pȯ-ˈnē How to pronounce Pawnee (audio)
pä-
plural Pawnee or Pawnees
: a member of an Indigenous people living in east-central Nebraska during the first half of the 19th century

Note: Current members of the Pawnee live as part of the federally recognized Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma.

Examples of Pawnee in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web The Saint Regis Mohawk Tribe, for example, requires twenty-five per cent Akwesasne Mohawk blood; the Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma mandates that an ancestor be on its 1937 roll and have an eighth Pawnee blood. Jay Caspian Kang, The New Yorker, 26 Feb. 2024 Accession Year: 1902 Description: This drum, made by a Pawnee man named George Beaver and collected by a Field Museum curator, was used in an important ceremony called Ghost Dance, said Matt Reed, the tribal historic preservation officer for the Pawnee Nation. Julia Jacobs, New York Times, 21 Feb. 2024 The comedy show, highlighting characters like Leslie Knope, is set in the fictional Pawnee, Indiana. The Indianapolis Star, 13 Feb. 2024 Are there dragons in Pawnee? Aubrey Plaza and Nick Offerman staged a fantastical Parks and Recreation reunion for a Super Bowl ad that aired during the big game between the San Francisco 49ers and Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday. EW.com, 11 Feb. 2024 In March 2017, Pawnee Nation filed a lawsuit suing some Oklahoma oil companies in tribal court, alleging that the companies had injected wastewater underground, which led to the earthquake. Mary Kekatos, ABC News, 13 Jan. 2024 The recent earthquakes fell short of the most powerful seismic event documented in state history, when a 5.8 magnitude earthquake took place on Sept. 3, 2016 near Pawnee in the northern part of Oklahoma. TIME, 13 Jan. 2024 Ditch the video of Senator Fake Pawnee Warren, though. Brian T. Allen, National Review, 14 Oct. 2023 For Alejandro González Iñárritu’s 2015 award-winning film The Revenant, the Mexican director also hired cultural consultants and teamed up with linguists to incorporate authentic Arikara and Pawnee language. Sandra Hale Schulman, Smithsonian Magazine, 12 Oct. 2023

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'Pawnee.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Etymology

of Siouan origin; akin to Osage ppáį Pawnee, Omaha ppáðį

First Known Use

1698, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of Pawnee was in 1698

Dictionary Entries Near Pawnee

Cite this Entry

“Pawnee.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Pawnee. Accessed 19 Mar. 2024.

Kids Definition

Pawnee

noun
Paw·​nee pȯ-ˈnē How to pronounce Pawnee (audio)
pä-
: a member of an American Indian people originally of Nebraska and Kansas

More from Merriam-Webster on Pawnee

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