Meaning

noun any of several tropical and subtropical treelike herbs of the genus Musa having a terminal crown of large entire leaves and usually bearing hanging clusters of elongated fruits

noun elongated crescent-shaped yellow fruit with soft sweet flesh

originBorrowed from Portuguese banana or Spanish banana, derived from a Niger-Congo language spoken in the Guinea region. Specific derivation is unclear. Possible ancestor or cognate languages include Wolof banaana, Eastern Maninkakan banana, and Vai ꕒꘌꕯ (ɓaana) or ꕒꕌꕯ (ɓaana), possibly from Arabic بَنَان (banān, “fingertip, banana”). However, Ay Baati Wolof (Munro & Gaye, 1997) posits that Wolof…

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 3.0