The New World settlers from the Mayflower weren’t called Pilgrims until two hundred years after their 1620 arrival at Plymouth Rock.
It was Daniel Webster, in a bicentennial celebration of their landing, who first described them as “Our Pilgrim Fathers.”
The word comes from a Latin derivative meaning a traveller.
Perager became pelegrin, then pilegrim in English, evolving into pilgrim.
The word “Pilgrim” was first used to describe Christians who made a journey of religious devotion to the Holy Land.
