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• pilgrim •

Pronunciation: pil-grêm • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun

Meaning: 1. A vagabond, wanderer, wayfarer, traveler. 2. A religious devotee who travels a long distance to a sacred site.

Notes: Every Thanksgiving people in the United States make pilgrimages homeward to spend the holiday their families. As you can see, pilgrims make pilgrimages. We may also pilgrimage to a special site, using the noun as a verb without any prefix or suffix.

In Play: The austere Puritans who founded Plymouth, Massachusetts, in 1620 were called 'pilgrims' because they fled religious persecution in England to a new home in America. The term was first applied in Governor William Bradford's Journal Of Plimouth Plantation, written between 1630 and 1650, then popularized in Cotton Mather's Magnalia Christi Americana (1702). Only half the 102 original Pilgrims survived their first winter at Plymouth. The remainder, with strong support of local Native Americans, survived to multiply and, joined by many others over the succeeding years, spread across the continent to build a nation.

Word History: I'm sure you've always wondered what falcons and pilgrims have in common. Today we find out. Pilgrim is a folk etymological rendering of Old French peligrin, since pil(l) and grim are true English words. Old French inherited the word from Latin peregrinus "foreign, strange", an adjective derived from pereger "abroad, away". Pereger was originally a compound comprising per "through, beyond" + ager "land, field", also found in agriculture. The root behind ager came through the Germanic line to English acre. The peregrine falcon's name came from a Latin phrase, falco peregrinus, so named because they were captured during migration rather than taken from their nest as fledglings.

John Wayne seemed to think everybody was a pilgrim.

Question to ponder: If the South had won the Civil War would we be making such a big deal about the Plymouth Pilgrims? Some of my ancestors beat the Pilgrims to America, but we just don't get no respect.

Another question to ponder: When did post-Civil War Reconstruction of the South end? Would you believe in the 20th century?

It seems to me our species, homo sapiens, might easily be renamed homo peregrinus. History shows perpetual wandering is as much a part of our nature as intelligence. Or perhaps our intelligence ("sapiens") spurs us to wander. Since we trekked out of Africa some 1.3 million years ago we have spanned the globe in our travels, probed its heights and depths, and have now left its surface entirely on our way to the planets and eventually the stars. What could be more peregrine? Our very nature commands us to "boldly go where no man has gone before." But our peregrinations are as much intellectual as physical. From rudimentary beginnings when man first asked "why" we have expanded our scientific knowledge from the micrososm of the quantum to the farthest reaches of the universe. Men are by nature pilgrims. When will their journey end?

Isn't there a Christian Saint named Peregrin?
Patron of Cancer patients.

St. Peregrine Laziosi is the patron saint of those suffering from Cancer. St. Peregrine had a cancer on his foot that was healed. He was a bad dude in his youth and once hit a priest in the face. When the priest turned the other cheek, the Lord convicted St. Peregrine of his sins and he became a Christian and a Monk.

Peregrin is one of the Hobbits in "The Lord of the Rings" Trilogy.

That is true, goes by "Pippin" if I remember correctly.