as in settler
a person who settles in a new region
over time the colonists began to sense that they were becoming a people unto themselves
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Recent Examples of colonist
The dodo’s extinction in the late 1600s, shortly after the arrival of European colonists on Mauritius, was driven by a combination of habitat destruction, hunting and the introduction of non-native animals.
—
Scott Travers, Forbes.com, 12 Apr. 2025
The thousands of white French colonists who fled Haiti and arrived in American communities after a particular moment of disruption in June 1793 were met with open arms, receiving support from private groups, state governments, and the U.S. Congress alike.
—Time, 9 June 2025
Seventeenth-century colonists believed that hairstyling—such as its ornamentation and its length—offered important evidence of a person’s social identity.
—Literary Hub, 9 June 2025
European colonists integrated North America into a trans-Atlantic mercantile capitalist economic system with no precedent in Indigenous society.
—Elic Weitzel, The Conversation, 29 May 2025
See All Example Sentences for colonist
Scott Travers, Forbes.com, 12 Apr. 2025
The thousands of white French colonists who fled Haiti and arrived in American communities after a particular moment of disruption in June 1793 were met with open arms, receiving support from private groups, state governments, and the U.S. Congress alike.
—Time, 9 June 2025
Seventeenth-century colonists believed that hairstyling—such as its ornamentation and its length—offered important evidence of a person’s social identity.
—Literary Hub, 9 June 2025
European colonists integrated North America into a trans-Atlantic mercantile capitalist economic system with no precedent in Indigenous society.
—Elic Weitzel, The Conversation, 29 May 2025
See All Example Sentences for colonist
Recent Examples of Synonyms for colonist
Noun
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Changing forests fueled tick risks During the 18th and 19th centuries, settlers cleared more than half the forested land across the northeastern U.S., cutting down forests for timber and to make way for farms, towns and mining operations.—
Sean Lawrence,
The Conversation,
18 June 2025
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Before European settlers arrived in California and insisted on suppressing fire at every turn, the landscape burned regularly.—
Jack Dolan,
Los Angeles Times,
16 June 2025
Noun
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The Mughal Empire’s hunger for land taxes, for instance, drove an assault on eastern India’s forests in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, which redistributed land to pioneer cultivators willing to undertake that work of settlement.—
Michael Albertus,
Foreign Affairs,
24 June 2025
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Additional investors include Fred Moll, the cofounder of Intuitive Surgical and pioneer of robotic surgery, who has joined the company’s strategic advisory board.—
Amy Feldman,
Forbes.com,
24 June 2025
Noun
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The book explores the lives of hitherto unknown Black women in colonial and Revolutionary New England and examines how patriarchy and race conjoined to affect the lives of Black women in the north.—
Eric E. Harrison,
Arkansas Online,
21 June 2025
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Slurp oysters at the Lewes Oyster House, a throwback to the 18th-century taverns that sprung up along the mid-Atlantic coast during colonial times.—
Tim Neville,
Travel + Leisure,
15 June 2025
Cite this Entry
“Colonist.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/colonist. Accessed 5 Jul. 2025.
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