Editing Carencro, Louisiana (section)

==Etymology==
Many senior Carencro natives attest that the town's name originates from before the [[American Civil War]].  According to this local legend, [[Indigenous peoples of the United States|Native Americans]] told [[Lafayette, Louisiana|Vermilionville]] settlers that in old times a large number of "carrion [[crows]]" ([[vultures]], called ''carencro'' in [[French language|French]]) had settled around the [[Vermilion River (Louisiana)|Vermilion River]] between Lafayette and [[Opelousas, Louisiana]] to feast on a [[fish die-off]].

There is a related theory, consistent with the spelling, that the place is named for the ''carencro tête rouge'', a red-headed [[buzzard]] referred to by [[Europe]]an explorers as early as 1699, and described in 1774 by [[Antoine-Simon Le Page du Pratz]].  Du Pratz described the bird as having black plumage and a head covered with red flesh.  He said the [[Spain|Spanish]] government protected the birds, ''"for as they do not use the whole carcass of the buffaloes which (the [[Spaniards]]) kill, those birds eat what they leave, which otherwise, by rotting on the ground, would ... infect the air."'' <ref name="autogenerated1">{{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20021223112207/http://www.carencrohighschool.org/la_studies/ParishSeries/LafayetteParish/Carencro.htm Jim Bradshaw, "Carencro name comes from old Attakapas legend"]}}, ''Lafayette (LA) Daily Advertiser'', January 27, 1998.</ref>

In a letter written on April 23, 1802, [[Martin Duralde]], a former commandant of the [[Opelousas]] post, related the legend as it had come down from an Attakapas Indian.  Duralde wrote:<blockquote> "Many years before the discovery of the elephant in the bayou called {{sic|Carancro}} an Attakapas savage had informed a man who is at present in my service in the capacity of cow-herd that the ancestors of his nation transmitted (the story) to their descendants that a beast of enormous size had perished either in this bayou or in one of the two water courses a short distance from it without their being able to indicate the true place, the antiquity of the event having without doubt made them forget it."</blockquote> (Note: The mastodon became extinct 4500–10,000 years ago)

A late 19th-century account stated the legend came from buzzards (vultures) feasting on a [[mastodon]] carcass. Its fossilized bones were reportedly discovered and collected by a [[France|French]] [[naturalist]] in the 18th century and shipped to the [[Jardin des Plantes]] of [[Paris]], but the ship was wrecked on the way, and the bones were lost at sea.  The only relic of the mastodon was a femur or leg bone, which was kept by an early settler, the first Guilbeau.  He used it as a pestle to bruise [[indigo]] for processing, a crop then cultivated in the [[Attakapas|Attakapas Indian]] country.  The Indians termed the birds ''carecros''; and from the spot where the mastodon died, the river takes the name of [[Bayou Carencro]].<ref>{{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20011204032952/http://carencrohighschool.org/LA_Studies/cajun/Buzzard.htm "How Buzzard's Prairie Got Its Name"]}}, reprinted in the ''Lafayette (LA) Daily Advertiser'' from the ''Lafayette (LA) Gazette'', May 22, 1897.</ref>

First called St. Pierre, in the late 19th century, the town was renamed Carencro, after the "carrion crow" (vulture) legend.  Although Carencro's current town center lies well west of the [[Vermilion River (Louisiana)|Vermilion River]], this legend has permanence within the community.

Some people think that the name comes from the [[Spanish language|Spanish]] ''carnero'', meaning "bone pile."  This idea also comes from the mastodon legend, and the idea that the buzzards left nothing but a pile of white bones after they had picked the mastodon clean.<ref name="autogenerated1"/>