gaucho

See also: gaúcho and Gaucho

English

A gaucho.

Etymology

Borrowed from Spanish gaucho, of uncertain origin.

Pronunciation

• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈɡaʊt͡ʃoʊ/
• Rhymes: -aʊtʃəʊ

Noun

gaucho (plural gauchos or gauchoes)

1. A cowboy of the South American pampas.
   • 1912, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Lost World […], London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC:

     Theirs was the spirit which upheld Darwin among the gauchos of the Argentine or Wallace among the head-hunters of Malaya.

2. (finance, historical) A proposed currency intended to be used by Argentina and Brazil to make interregional payments.

Derived terms

• gauchos (clothing)
• gauchesque

Translations

South American cowboy

• Armenian: գաուչո (gaučʻo)
• Catalan: gautxo m
• Esperanto: gaŭĉo
• French: gaucho (fr) m
• German: Gaucho (de) m
• Hebrew: גאוצ׳ו (he)
• Japanese: ガウチョ (gaucho)
• Korean: 가우초 (gaucho)
• Macedonian: га́учо m (gáučo)
• Mapudungun: huachu
• Polish: gaucho (pl) m
• Portuguese: gaúcho (pt) m
• Russian: га́учо (ru) m (gáučo)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: га̀учо m

  Latin: gàučo (sh) m

• Spanish: gaucho (es) m
• Ukrainian: га́учо m (háučo)

See also

• huaso
• charro
• cowboy
• llanero
• vaquero

Further reading

• gaucho on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• guacho

French

Etymology 1

Borrowed from Spanish gaucho.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɡo.ʃo/, /ɡot.ʃo/, (rare) /ɡa.ut.ʃo/

• Audio:

  (file)

Noun

gaucho m (plural gauchos)

1. gaucho (Argentine cowboy)

Etymology 2

From gauche +‎ -o.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɡo.ʃo/

• Audio:

  (file)

Noun

gaucho m (plural gauchos)

1. (derogatory) leftist, leftie

Further reading

• “gaucho”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012

Romanian

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from Spanish gaucho.

Noun

gaucho m (plural gaucho)

1. gaucho

Declension

	singular		plural
	indefinite	definite	indefinite	definite
nominative-accusative	gaucho	gauchoul	gaucho	gauchoi
genitive-dative	gaucho	gauchoului	gaucho	gaucholor
vocative	gauchoule		gaucholor

Spanish

Etymology

Of unknown origin, probably from a South American indigenous language, such as Mapudungun cauchu (“vagrant, wanderer”), kauču (“friend”), or Quechua wahcha (“vagabond, poor person”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈɡaut͡ʃo/ [ˈɡau̯.t͡ʃo]
• Rhymes: -autʃo
• Syllabification: gau‧cho

Adjective

gaucho (feminine gaucha, masculine plural gauchos, feminine plural gauchas)

1. (Rioplatense) possessing traditional, especially Argentine, cowboy virtues; noble, valiant, generous
2. (South America, informal) helpful

Noun

gaucho m (plural gauchos)

1. (Paraguay, Rioplatense) cowboy

   Synonyms: charro, huaso, llanero, vaquero

Derived terms

• agauchado
• gauchesco
• gauchismo

Descendants

• → Portuguese: gaúcho

Further reading

• “gaucho”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8.1, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 15 December 2025
• gaucho on the Spanish Wikipedia.Wikipedia ^es