Meanings
plural medicine women
- A female Native American (or, any other indigenous) shamanistic healer.
Near-synonym: shaman
1 more example
Some twenty hours later his son was born, two months early, in the tepee of a skilled medicine woman.
1950, Dorothy M. Johnson, A Man Called Horse; in Indian Country, London: Corgi, 1961, page 185Synonyms: shaman
Synonyms & antonyms
nounA female Native American (or, any other indigenous) shamanistic healer.
Origin
- Ojibwemashkikiiwininiikwe“female doctor”
- Englishmedicine woman
Probably a calque of Ojibwe mashkikiiwininiikwe (“female doctor”), from mashkiki (“medicine”) + inini (“man”) + ikwe (“woman”).
More words from Ojibwe
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Danish klog kone, medicinkvinde
- klog koneshamanistic healer
- medicinkvindeshamanistic healer
Dutch medicijnvrouw
- medicijnvrouwshamanistic healer
Esperanto kuraculino
- kuraculinoshamanistic healer
French femme-médecine, sorcière
- femme-médecineshamanistic healer
- sorcièreshamanistic healer
German Medizinfrau
- Medizinfraushamanistic healer
Norwegian Bokmål medisinkvinne
- medisinkvinneshamanistic healer
Polish znachorka, babka
- znachorkashamanistic healer
- babkashamanistic healer
Swedish medicinkvinna
- medicinkvinnashamanistic healer
Cite this entry
medicine woman. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/medicine%20woman
“medicine woman.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/medicine%20woman. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “medicine woman,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/medicine%20woman.
Source: medicine woman on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.