voyageur means A trader, particularly in furs, who worked (and explored) in the area of Canada and the northern United States from the 16th to early 19th centuries; they were often of Quebecois extraction. Lexicurio rates it Rare gem — a strength score of 84 out of 100.
Why “voyageur” is a great word
VOYAGEUR — [Noun] A contracted laborer in the North American fur trade who transported goods and people across vast inland waterways by canoe from the 16th to early 19th centuries. The word is an unadapted borrowing from Canadian French voyageur, from French voyage ('journey') + agent suffix -eur ('one who does'); first attested in English in 1793. Unlike an 'explorer,' who traveled to discover, or a 'coureur des bois,' an unlicensed and independent woodsman, the voyageur was a professional porter of the wilderness, the essential muscle of a vast commercial network. He is the calloused hand gripping a cedar paddle from dawn to dusk, the deep-throated chanson echoing off a granite cliff, and the weight of a ninety-pound pack carried at a trot across a bruised portage trail—a figure for whom the epic journey was merely a commute, mapping a continent with the weariness of his own body.
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from Canadian French voyageur.
noun
- A trader, particularly in furs, who worked (and explored) in the area of Canada and the northern United States from the 16th to early 19th centuries; they were often of Quebecois extraction.“The powers of the Canadian voyageurs and hunters in the consumption of meat strike the greenhorn with wonder and astonishment; and are only equalled by the gastronomical capabilities exhibited by Indian dogs, both following the same plan in their epicurean gorgings.”