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Creole - 6 dictionary results
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Cre⋅ole

   [kree-ohl]
–noun
1. a person born in the West Indies or Spanish America but of European, usually Spanish, ancestry.
2. a person born in Louisiana but of usually French ancestry.
3. (sometimes lowercase) a person of mixed black and European, esp. French or Spanish, ancestry who speaks a creolized form of French or Spanish.
4. (usually lowercase) a creolized language; a pidgin that has become the native language of a speech community. Compare pidgin.
5. the creolized French language of the descendants of the original settlers of Louisiana. Compare Cajun.
6. Haitian Creole.
7. (usually lowercase) Archaic. a black person born in the New World, as distinguished from one brought there from Africa.
–adjective
8. (sometimes lowercase) of, pertaining to, or characteristic of a Creole or Creoles.
9. (usually lowercase) Cookery. indicating a spicy sauce or dish made esp. with tomatoes, peppers, onions, celery, and seasonings, and often served with rice.
10. (sometimes lowercase) bred or growing in a country, but of foreign origin, as an animal or plant.
Origin:
1595–1605; < F < Sp criollo < Pg crioulo native, deriv. of criar to bring up < L creāre; see create
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.
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Cre·ole     (krē'ōl')  Pronunciation Key 
n.  
  1. A person of European descent born in the West Indies or Spanish America.
    1. A person descended from or culturally related to the original French settlers of the southern United States, especially Louisiana.
    2. The French dialect spoken by these people.
  3. A person descended from or culturally related to the Spanish and Portuguese settlers of the Gulf States.
  4. often creole A person of mixed Black and European ancestry who speaks a creolized language, especially one based on French or Spanish.
  5. A Black slave born in the Americas as opposed to one brought from Africa.
  6. creole A creolized language.
  7. Haitian Creole.
adj.  
  1. Of, relating to, or characteristic of the Creoles.
  2. creole Cooked with a spicy sauce containing tomatoes, onions, and peppers: shrimp creole; creole cuisine.

[French créole, from Spanish criollo, person native to a locality, from Portuguese crioulo, diminutive of cria, person raised in the house, especially a servant, from criar, to bring up, from Latin creāre, to beget; see ker-2 in Indo-European roots.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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creole 
1604, from Fr. creole, from Sp. criollo "person native to a locality," from Port. crioulo, dim. of cria "person (especially a servant) raised in one's house," from criar "to raise or bring up," from L. creare "to produce, create." The exact sense varies with local use. Originally with no connotation of color or race; Fowler (1926) writes: "Creole does not imply mixture of race, but denotes a person either of European or (now rarely) of negro descent born and naturalized in certain West Indian and American countries."

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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creole

adjective
1. of or relating to a language that arises from contact between two other languages and has features of both; "Creole grammars" 
2. of or relating to or characteristic of native-born persons of French descent in Louisiana; "Creole cooking" 

noun
1. a person of European descent born in the West Indies or Latin America 
2. a person descended from French ancestors in southern United States (especially Louisiana) 
3. a mother tongue that originates from contact between two languages 

WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University.
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Creole

Cre"ole\ (kr?"?l), n. [F. cr?ole, Sp. criollo, from an American negro word, perh. a corruption of a Sp. criadillo, dim. of criado servant, formerly also, child, fr. L. creatus, p. p. of creare to create. Cf. Create.] One born of European parents in the American colonies of France or Spain or in the States which were once such colonies, esp. a person of French or Spanish descent, who is a native inhabitant of Louisiana, or one of the States adjoining, bordering on the Gulf of of Mexico.

Note: "The term creole negro is employed in the English West Indies to distinguish the negroes born there from the Africans imported during the time of the slave trade. The application of this term to the colored people has led to an idea common in some parts of the United States, though wholly unfounded, that it implies an admixture greater or less of African blood." --R. Hildreth.

Note: "The title [Creole] did not first belong to the descendants of Spanish, but of French, settlers, But such a meaning implied a certain excellence of origin, and so came early to include any native of French or Spanish descent by either parent, whose nonalliance with the slave race entitled him to social rank. Later, the term was adopted by, not conceded to, the natives of mixed blood, and is still so used among themselves. . . . Besides French and Spanish, there are even, for convenience of speech, 'colored' Creoles; but there are no Italian, or Sicilian, nor any English, Scotch, Irish, or 'Yankee' Creoles, unless of parentage married into, and themselves thoroughly proselyted in, Creole society." --G. W. Cable.

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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Creole

Cre"ole\ (kr?"?l), a. Of or pertaining to a Creole or the Creoles.

Note: In New Orleans the word Creole is applied to any product, or variety of manufacture, peculiar to Louisiana; as, Creole ponies, chickens, cows, shoes, eggs, wagons, baskets, etc.

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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