​PIROGUE, or Piragua (the French and Spanish forms respectively of a Caribbean word for this type of vessel; it has at various times taken many corrupt forms, e.g. periagua, pettiaugua, pettyoagar), originally the native name of a vessel made by hollowing out the trunk of a tree, a “ dug-out ”; hence applied to many different developments of this type of vessel used in the West Indies and along the American coast. An early improvement was to split the “ dug-out ” into two sections and insert a flat bottom of planking to widen it; another form had a leeboard, was decked in at either end, and had two masts.