gunfighter

[guhn-fahy-ter]

noun

1. a person highly skilled in the use of a gun gin gun and a veteran of many gunfights, especially one living during the frontier days of the American West.

Word History and Origins

Origin of gunfighter¹

An Americanism dating back to 1890–95; gun ¹ + fighter

Example Sentences

Sometimes it’s Marty Robbins’ “Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs,” which is a good one.

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During the next few years, Kilmer was critically lauded as the alcoholic gunfighter Doc Holliday in the 1993 western “Tombstone.”

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Finbar is the longtime gunfighter who works by a strict moral code, looking to finally hang up his spurs and domesticate himself.

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His father, a Russian émigré, was best known for his starring role in both the stage and screen versions of the musical “The King and I,” and later played lead Hollywood roles as a gunfighter, a Russian general and, in “The Ten Commandments,” Pharaoh Rameses II. A-list glamour encircled the son: Liza Minnelli was a lifelong friend from childhood; Elizabeth Taylor came to all his parties.

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Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has frequently adopted the pose of a swaggering gunfighter out of the Wild West.

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