What is the meaning of Tumacácori?
The meaning of the Arizona place name "Tumacácori" in the O'odham language is uncertain and not definitively known.
The name originated from the O'odham residents' response to Jesuit missionary Eusebio Francisco Kino's inquiry about the village's name in January 1691. The O'odham language was not a written language, and Kino recorded the name with Spanish phonetics for Spanish speakers. The O'odham words they used to describe the place were not accurately captured, resulting in the uncertainty of the meaning.
Since then, there has been various translations and interpretations of the name "Tumacácori" have been proposed over time. Some of these include "crooked rock," "place where the wild chiltepin chiles are gathered," "place of the flat rock," "flat, rocky place," "caliche bend," and "pepper bush." Different sources provide different translations based on their research and understanding of the O'odham language.
The name has undergone variations in spelling over the years, including Tumagacori, Tumacacor, and Tumacacori. The use of accents in written Spanish is a modern convention, and historically, the accent mark over the second "a" was not included.
Get to know the oasis of the Sonoran Desert, Tumacácori mission first-hand with a former National Park Service Ranger who lived in the National Historical Park here.
Source: https://www.nps.gov/tuma/faqs.htm
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