peon
noun
[ ˈpiːən ]
• a Spanish American day labourer or unskilled farm worker.
• (in South and SE Asia) a low-ranking worker such as an attendant, orderly, or assistant.
• "the elder son is a peon at a nearby school"
• a bullfighter who uses banderillas (darts thrust into a bull's neck or shoulders); a banderillero.
Origin:
from Portuguese peão and Spanish peón, from medieval Latin pedo, pedon- ‘walker, foot soldier’, from Latin pes, ped- ‘foot’. Compare with pawn1.
