nyam

• (Balearic, Central, Valencian) IPA^(key): /ˈɲam/

Probably from Wolof ñàmbi (“cassava”) or a related word. Compare Spanish ñame.

nyam m (plural nyams)

1. yam (edible root of Dioscorea vine)

Onomatopoeic

nyam

1. (childish) food

• fer nyam
• nyam-nyam

• “nyam” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
• “nyam”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2023
• “nyam” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

Borrowed from Wolof nyam, nyami, nyamnyam (“food; to eat”), or from Fula nyama, nyami, nyamgo (“to eat”). Possibly via Ghanaian Pidgin English. Many other West African languages use similar terms for "flesh" or "meat", such as: Chichewa nyama, Efik unam, Esimbi ɛnyimi, Hausa nama, Lingala nyama, Swahili nyama, and Zulu inyama. Also compare Hausa nyamnyam, yamyam (“cannibal”) and Luba-Kasai nyama (“animal”).

• IPA^(key): /ɲam/

nyam

1. food, meal

nyam

1. eat (eat)

   Dem man nyam di whole ah di bread. And wan' come gi' wi crumbs.

   Those guys ate all of the bread, and now they want to give us crumbs.

2. consume, use up, (wastefully) spend, waste (waste)

   We cyaan nyam everything weh we get. Wi haffi save some and invest some.

   We shouldn't waste everything we get. We have to save and invest some of it.

   Me jus go home and nyam di money.

   I just went home. Then I spent all the money.

• eat
• nyam up
• dawg nyam yuh suppa

• Richard Allsopp, editor, Dictionary of Caribbean English Usage, Kingston, Jamaica: University of the West Indies Press, 1996 (2003 printing), →ISBN, page 410
• nyam – jamaicans.com Jamaican Patois dictionary
• Huber, Magnus (1999) Ghanaian Pidgin English in Its West African Context, John Benjamins Publishing, →ISBN, page 102
• Cassidy, Frederic Gomes; Le Page, Robert Brock, editors (2002) Dictionary of Jamaican English, 2nd edition, University of the West Indies Press, →ISBN, page 325
• Sheller, Mimi (2003) Consuming the Caribbean: From Arawaks to Zombies, Routledge, →ISBN

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

nyam

1. yam

• Nigerian Pidgin by Nicholas Faraclas, publ. Routledge, 1996