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Boer (bôr, bōər, br)
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n.
A Dutch colonist or descendant of a Dutch colonist in South Africa.
[Afrikaans, from Dutch boer, farmer, peasant, of Low German or dialectal (northeast Netherlands) Dutch origin; akin to standard Dutch buur, neighbor, from Middle Dutch buur, inhabitant, resident, variant of gebuur; see bheuə- in the Appendix of Indo-European roots.]
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.

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