cowboys and Indians

American  

noun

1. a children's game in which players imitate the supposed behavior of cowboys and Indians in conflict, as in shooting, chasing, and capturing.

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Etymology

Origin of cowboys and Indians

An Americanism dating back to 1885–90

Example Sentences

The Western was once Hollywood’s signature genre, and “Imagining the Indian” revisits cowboys and Indians movies, television shows and cartoons in a rapid-fire introductory montage.

From Washington Post • Apr. 4, 2023

One of the foundational themes of the western is the making of America, an origin story that plays out in tales about frontiers, borders, wagon trains, settlements, railroads, towns, cowboys and Indians.

From New York Times • Dec. 14, 2017

Cody spread the word about cowboys and Indians, Battle of the Little Bighorn and the Deadwood Stage throughout Europe.

From Washington Times • Aug. 2, 2017

Growing up in Texas, the son of a poor cotton farmer, he’d been enchanted by tales of the Osage Hills—that vestige of the American frontier where cowboys and Indians were said to still roam.

From The New Yorker • Mar. 1, 2017

He became a plain on which, like the cowboys and Indians in the movies, she and her husband fought.

From "Song of Solomon" by Toni Morrison