Meerkat" is a loanword from Afrikaans (pronounced [ˈmeərkɐt]).[3] The name has a Dutch origin, but by misidentification. In Dutch, meerkat means the guenon, a monkey of the Cercopithecus genus.[4] The word meerkat is Dutch for "sea cat", but although the suricata is a feliform, it is not of the cat family;[5] the word possibly started as a Dutch adaptation of a derivative of Sanskrit markaṭa मर्कट = "ape",[6] perhaps in Africa via an Indian sailor on board a Dutch East India Company ship.