Parrot-men

Here’s another l/r swap: loro comes from the Carib roro and was used to designate both (reddish) parrots and (again on the basis of colour) native American slaves, as in “vos fasemos merced de toda manera desclavos negros o loros o otros de los que en españa son tenidos por esclavos e que por razon lo deven ser” (1499 instructions to Pinzón, quoted in Jack D Forbes, Africans and Native Americans: The Language of Race and the Evolution of Red-Black Peoples).

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