embusqué

British

/ ɑ̃byske /

noun

a man who avoids military conscription by obtaining a government job

"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

Etymology

Origin of embusqué

C20: from embusquer to lie in ambush, shirk

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.

During the month that had elapsed Robin had been recaptured, other officers had escaped, the whole course of the war was changing, and here was I still embusqué in Constantinople.

From Project Gutenberg

And an embusqué manqué is a slacker who fortuitously has failed to win the fungus wreath of slackerdom.

From Project Gutenberg

Now an embusqué is a slacker who lies in the safe ambush of a soft job.

From Project Gutenberg

Do you take me for an embusqué manqué?”

From Project Gutenberg

Yet he- 40 - was obliged to wait upon a little screaming man, five feet two, whose nose had been shot away, exchanged for the Médaille Militaire upon his breast, who screamed out to him: “Bring me the basin, embusqué!”

From Project Gutenberg

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023