samurai

American  

[sam-oo-rahy] / ˈsæm ʊˌraɪ /

noun

Japanese History.

plural

samurai

1. a member of the hereditary warrior class in feudal Japan.

2. a retainer of a daimyo.

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samurai British  

/ ˈsæmʊˌraɪ, ˈsæmjʊ- /

noun

1. the Japanese warrior caste that provided the administrative and fighting aristocracy from the 11th to the 19th centuries

2. a member of this aristocracy

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Etymology

Origin of samurai

1720–30; < Japanese, earlier samurafi to serve, equivalent to sa- prefix + morafi watchfully wait (frequentative of mor- to guard)

Example Sentences

The second is a story of brothers – one a samurai, the other a shinobi – pitted against each other by an arrogant, cruel father.

From Salon

Her last opponent, Bill himself, pitches a private beach sword fight at sunrise “like a couple real-life honest-to-goodness samurais.”

From Los Angeles Times

Caesar did a Japanese samurai warrior into whose ersatz-Japanese monologue would slip in the occasional Yiddish word.

From The Wall Street Journal

The woodcutter claims he had found a samurai’s body in the forest near Nara.

From The Wall Street Journal

Considering the Meiji period was when the samurai became obsolete, the potential for social commentary mixed in with high-stakes combat seems pretty high.

From Los Angeles Times