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My research has resulted in theoretical reasons for the usage of the term "nigger", and I have failed to uncover any evidence as to how this nasty little epithet evolved into the usage and connotation it had and has to this day.

When the African slave-trade was in full-swing , my belief is that a good percentage of black slaves were captured and sold in Nigeria. If the ship's captain could read, he would probably not be able to pronounce "Nigeria" or "Nigerian" properly nor would he care. Since a four syllable word is difficult to pronounce anyway for the education level of seamen in the slave-trade of that era, I believe the term was shortened from nigerian to nigger which was easier for them to say.

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    The country "Nigeria" (it was named by a british female journalist around 1900) was so-named simply because words like "negre" and "negr", etc, simply means "black" in many languages. As Barrie explains "Niger" even means "black" in Latin. The rude word (and also just "Negro") was used way before "Nigeria" was named, or even I think "discovered" by Europeans.
    – Fattie
    Sep 18, 2014 at 10:14
  • These are actually and surprisingly unrelated. While Nigger derives from Latin, Nigeria and Niger (and the country north to it) are both named after the Niger River which, in turn, most likely got it's English after it's Tuareg name Egerew n-Igerewen (the n-Iger part is what you want to look at).
    – Lior
    Mar 27, 2016 at 14:12
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    Although, according to etymonlie.com: "named for the river Niger ... probably an alteration (by influence of Latin niger "black") of a local Tuareg name" So they are indirectly related.
    – user184130
    Jul 27, 2018 at 22:39

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Niger is Latin for 'black'. That's the source of all the trouble. Nigger itself (with the Latin spelling) is recorded in the Oxford English Dictionary as being first used in 1574 'by whites or other non-blacks as a relatively neutral (or occasionally positive) term, with no specifically hostile intent'.

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    Purely my own opinion, but I've always assumed the Texan/"Deep South" pronunciation of "negro" as "nigra" was part of the process by which "nigger" became ultra-offensive. But by now "negro", and even black are sensitive words in many contexts.
    – FumbleFingers
    Jan 7, 2012 at 2:00
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    Basically, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigger
    – Glorious Kale
    Jan 11, 2015 at 19:57
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According to Etymonline.com:

nigger 1786, earlier neger (1568, Scottish and northern England dialect), from Fr. nègre, from Sp. negro (see Negro). From the earliest usage it was "the term that carries with it all the obloquy and contempt and rejection which whites have inflicted on blacks" [cited in Gowers, 1965, probably Harold R. Isaacs].

So it appears your theory about it having to do with Nigeria is merely a folk (or idiosyncratic) etymology.

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    Hey -cool! I like the way you say idiosyncratic. That's a new word for me. Thanks!
    – Harry O Gliffics
    Jan 6, 2012 at 19:55
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As Barrie England's reference indicates, it was originally neutral, and therefor not an epithet. The question that is not being addressed in any of the answers so far is the process by which the neutral term became one. The answer to this is of course is the entire history of the relationship between the white and negro races over the past 500 years or so, but I'm guessing it did not become a widely used term of derision until black people started getting 'uppity'. That is, when most of them 'knew their place' and there was no push-back, the term was neutral. Only when they began to be a 'problem' and the whites had cause for fear and resentment, did it take on the shades it has had for the past (guessing again) century and a half.

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  • The word "epithet" was originally neutral, and therefore not an epithet. :P
    – ShreevatsaR
    Jan 8, 2012 at 5:31
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    @ShreevatsaR - Epithet has several meanings. In my experience, the one used here is the least frequently used.
    – MickeyfAgain_BeforeExitOfSO
    Jan 9, 2012 at 1:37
  • The term was use more or less with aplomb even in the South (urban Texas that is) except when one's status (Mexican or White) was imagined to be threatened. a
    – lex
    Oct 17, 2012 at 21:25

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