bivouac
Americannoun
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a military encampment made with tents or improvised shelters, usually without shelter or protection from enemy fire.
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the place used for such an encampment.
verb (used without object)
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bivouacs,
present (3rd person singular)
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bivouacked,
past participle, past
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bivouacking
present participle
noun
verb
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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bivouacsimple
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bivouacssimple
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have bivouackedperfect
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has bivouackedperfect
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am bivouackingprogressive
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are bivouackingprogressive
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is bivouackingprogressive
-
have been bivouackingperfect progressive
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has been bivouackingperfect progressive
Past
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bivouackedsimple
-
had bivouackedperfect
-
was bivouackingprogressive
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were bivouackingprogressive
-
had been bivouackingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of bivouac
1700–10; < French < Swiss German bīwacht auxiliary patrol, equivalent to bī- by- + wacht patrol, watch
Explanation
If you ever draped a blanket over bushes or lawn chairs in the backyard and pretended to bunk down under it when you were a kid, you’ve made a bivouac — a temporary, makeshift camp with little or no cover. Bivouac comes from the 18th-century German word biwacht, and originally meant a patrol of ordinary citizens who helped the town’s night watchmen. Nowadays, you’ll most often see it used as a noun, but it can be a verb too — and it's often associated with soldiers, though that’s not essential. If you tend to sleepwalk, you might not want to bivouac at the edge of that cliff; make your bivouac in the meadow instead.
Vocabulary lists containing bivouac
Code Talker
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Into Thin Air
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Tolkien Reading Day, List 6
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Kovacs said that lifting Dickey will likely take several days, and that several bivouac points are being prepared along the way so that Dickey and rescue teams can rest.
From Washington Times ● Sep. 7, 2023
The bivouac fell into a ravine, but no one happened to be in the building at the time.
From Scientific American ● Apr. 3, 2023
"Many, we understand, are provided with or are providing themselves with tents and intend to bivouac in the fields."
From BBC ● Aug. 12, 2022
The whole population was busy all night, and the streets are now like a bivouac with sleeping men.
From Seattle Times ● Oct. 7, 2021
Five minutes after waking up, I was climbing away from the bivouac.
From "Into the Wild" by Jon Krakauer
Like modern-day companies that merge and re-emerge or fold, some of these schools went under quickly, or moved their bivouacs, or combined forces.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 22, 2026
A rational leader would call off the attack, send the troops back to their bivouacs, and send envoys to the negotiating tables, where many other games can be played.
From Slate ● Jan. 14, 2022
This vast camp is now entirely abandoned, its installations reaching far into the dense foliage: bivouacs, tents and sturdier structures in what little dappled sunlight penetrates the roof of leaves overhead.
From The Guardian ● Sep. 25, 2016
After stopping to rest at the final of five bivouacs established at intervals along the way, Mr. Westhauser was lifted to safety through the final, narrow shaft to the surface of the mountain.
From New York Times ● Jun. 19, 2014
In English, that meant: To all units: Japanese are booby-trapping personnel equipment, installations, and bivouacs.
From "Code Talker: A Novel About the Navajo Marines of World War Two" by Joseph Bruchac
Kamil Szymanski, the CEO of G2A Arena where scores of G.I.s have bivouacked, said his company is happy to do its part in difficult times and will “work tirelessly to support the 82nd Airborne Division.”
From Washington Times ● Mar. 3, 2022
Regime forces were bivouacked on the outskirts, and locals were afraid to talk.
From The New Yorker ● Dec. 3, 2018
During the Civil War, troops bivouacked in farm fields.
From Washington Post ● May 1, 2018
Kansas volunteers bivouacked in the East Room to protect Abraham Lincoln, and the president tested rifles on the grounds around the house.
From Time ● Aug. 2, 2017
Scores of Rai and Tamang porters from the low foothills—dressed in thin rags and flip-flops, they were working as load bearers for various expeditions—were bivouacked in caves and under boulders on the surrounding slopes.
From "Into Thin Air" by Jon Krakauer
I knew the signs of a bivouacking militia and something less sinister.
From Slate ● Feb. 10, 2017
We'd be entirely self-supported, schlepping all our own gear and bivouacking in the saddles between the peaks.
From National Geographic ● Aug. 10, 2015
Somehow they managed to keep moving until after dark, finally bivouacking on a thin ledge.
From National Geographic ● Jul. 14, 2015
On indie screens, Restrepo, the Sebastian Junger doc about bivouacking with an Army troop in Afghanistan, earned $30,453 on two screens, giving it the highest per-screen average of any new movie.
From Time ● Jun. 27, 2010
The night before the battle of Vittoria I was bivouacking in the open country.
From The Serapion Brethren. Vol. II by Ernst Theordor Wilhelm Hoffmann
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
