faʻaipoipo

Tahitian

Etymology

From faʻa (“causative prefix”) +‎ ipoipo (“reduplication of ipo (a lover)”). Cognates include Tuamotuan hakaipoipo, Austral haʻaipoipo, Rarotongan ʻakaipoipo, Samoan faʻaipoipo, Tuvaluan fakaipoipo, Maori whakaipo (“to tend with affection, cherish, court, woo, pet, coax”), Hawaiian hoʻoipo (“to make love, court, woo”).

Noun

faʻaipoipo (Raapoto spelling faaipoipo)

1. to marry

Further reading

• Yves Lemaître, Lexique du tahitien contemporain (Current Tahitian lexicon), 1995.
• “faʻaipoipo” in Dictionnaire en ligne Tahitien/Français (Online Tahitian–French Dictionary), by the Tahitian Academy.