Yankee

(yahngk'e.) A popular cant name applied in its original sense to a native or in hab. of New England, but commonly used by foreigners in application to any inhabitant of the N. States of the Amer. Union, in the same way that John Bull denotes an English man. Va rio us etymological sources have been a igned to the derivation of the term, which, however, is most generally believed to have originated in a corrupt pronunciation of the word English by the native Indians of America, who called the early settlers from Great Britain Yengeese. [s. 973]