hunter-gatherer

noun

hunt·​er-gath·​er·​er ˈhən-tər-ˈga-t͟hər-ər 

: a member of a culture in which food is obtained by hunting, fishing, and foraging rather than by agriculture or animal husbandry

Examples of hunter-gatherer in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Scientists previously found that some 5,500 years ago, wild horses may have first been domesticated by the Botai people—early hunter-gatherers in what is now Kazakhstan—and likely used for their milk and meat. —Christian Thorsberg, Smithsonian Magazine, 10 June 2024

The harsh realities of the Ice Age – scarce food, rising population and the limitations of hunter-gatherer life drove tribes to eat each other for sheer survival. —Avya Chaudhary, Discover Magazine, 3 June 2024

The four oldest canoes — the ones from the Late Archaic period — were used when nomadic hunter-gatherers lived in seasonal communities and southern Wisconsin was covered in savannah and prairie. —Sophie Carson, Journal Sentinel, 23 May 2024

The theory rose to prominence in 1968, when anthropologists Richard B. Lee and Irven DeVore published Man the Hunter, an edited collection of scholarly papers presented at a 1966 symposium on contemporary hunter-gatherer societies. —Cara Ocobock, Scientific American, 1 Nov. 2023

Word History

First Known Use

1938, in the meaning defined above

Kids Definition

hunter-gatherer

noun

hunt·​er-gath·​er·​er

-ˈgat͟h-ər-ər,

-ˈget͟h-

: a member of a culture in which food is gotten by hunting, fishing, and gathering rather than by agriculture