banyan

Meanings

1. An Indian trader, merchant, cashier, or money changer.
2. A tropical Indian fig tree, Ficus benghalensis, that has many aerial roots.
3. Various other trees of the Ficus subgenus Urostigma, especially Ficus pertusa (Central American banyan) and Ficus microcarpa (Chinese banyan or Malayan banyan).
4. A type of loose gown worn in India.
5. A vest; an undershirt; a singlet.
6. A camping excursion on shore, to give a ship's crew a break from shipboard routine.

1. A locality in the Shire of Buloke, north western Victoria, Australia

Etymology

From Portuguese baniano, from Arabic بَنِيَان (baniyān), from Gujarati વાણિયો (vāṇiyo, “merchant”), from Sanskrit वाणिज (vāṇijá), from earlier वणिज् (vaṇíj, “merchant, trader”). The name appears to have been first bestowed popularly on a famous tree of this species growing near Bandar Abbas, under which the Bannians, or Hindu traders settled at that port, had built a little pagoda. Doublet of bunnia.