ambuscade

[am-buh-skeyd, am-buh-skeyd]

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR ambuscade ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

an ambush.

verb (used without object), am·bus·cad·ed, am·bus·cad·ing.

to lie in ambush.

verb (used with object), am·bus·cad·ed, am·bus·cad·ing.

to attack from a concealed position; ambush.

Origin of ambuscade

1575–85; < Middle French embuscade, alteration (under influence of Old French embuschier; see ambush) of Middle French emboscade < Old Italian imboscata, feminine past participle of imboscare, verbal derivative with in- in-² of bosco wood, forest < Germanic *bosk- bush¹

Related formsam·bus·cad·er, noun

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for ambuscade

ensnare, bushwhack, attack, trap, waylay, surprise

Examples from the Web for ambuscade

Historical Examples of ambuscade

How is it you know there is an ambuscade laid to catch us napping?
The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields
Lieut. Howard Payson
This was the place of the ambuscade, where his army was cut to pieces.
Chronicles of Border Warfare
Alexander Scott Withers
Here a thousand Indians had planted themselves in ambuscade.
King Philip
John S. C. (John Stevens Cabot) Abbott
But the darkness, which had favored the ambuscade, now defeated their object.
The Night Riders
Ridgwell Cullum
And as to the wine-cup and slumber—these I guard against, even as a man might guard against an ambuscade.
Hiero
Xenophon

British Dictionary definitions for ambuscade

ambuscade

noun

an ambush

verb

to ambush or lie in ambush

Word Origin for ambuscade

C16: from French embuscade, from Old Italian imboscata, probably of Germanic origin; compare ambush

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for ambuscade

1580s, essentially a variant form of ambush (n.), representing a reborrowing of that French word after it had been Italianized. Ambuscade is from French embuscade (16c.), Gallicized from Italian imboscata, literally "a hiding in the bush," compounded from the same elements as Old French embuscher. Sometimes in English as ambuscado, with faux Spanish ending of the sort popular in 17c.