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Mameluco
Mameluco the word is believed to be of Arabic origin. The word in Arabic is Mamluk (masculine) or Mamluka (feminine) ????? (masculine) or ?????? (feminine). The word Mameluco is a term of Portuguese origin describing the first generation offspring of a European and an Amerindian. The corresponding Spanish word is mestizo.
In the 17th and 18th centuries, Mameluco was used to refer to organized bands of slave-hunters, also known as bandeirantes, who roamed the interior of South America from the Atlantic to the foothills of the Andes, and from Paraguay to the Orinoco river, invading Guarani-occupied areas in search of slaves. The word may have become common in Portugal in the Middle Ages, deriving from the Arabic 'mamlûk', used in the association with the Mamluks.This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Mameluco". The list of authors you can find on this page.