muscleman

American  

[muhs-uhl-man] / ˈmʌs əlˌmæn /

noun

musclemen plural

1. Informal. a man with a muscular or brawny physique, especially a bodybuilder.

2. Slang. a bodyguard, especially one hired to intimidate others, often by strong-arm methods.

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muscleman British  

/ ˈmʌsəlˌmæn /

noun

1. a man with highly developed muscles

2. a henchman employed by a gangster to intimidate or use violence upon victims

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• musclemen
  plural

Etymology

Origin of muscleman

An Americanism dating back to 1925–30; muscle + man

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

muscleman musclemen

He crooks his arms in a kind of a hybrid muscleman flex/double thumbs-up/Fonzie “eyyyyy” pose.

From Washington Post ● Jul. 15, 2020

But more to the point, I long to see my life reflected on the screen, and last I checked there was no flying saucer or caped muscleman flying outside my window.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 1, 2018

By now, most of American knows that movie muscleman Arnold Schwarzenegger will take President-elect Donald Trump’s place as host of NBC’s “The Apprentice,” which will be renamed “The Celebrity Apprentice” and debuts Jan. 2.

From Washington Times ● Dec. 20, 2016

There were other applicants, including Mike Souchak, a muscleman himself, and Ken Venturi, the betting favorite to succeed Ben Hogan atop golf.

From Golf Digest ● Sep. 25, 2016

And rounding off the ensemble are Zoe Saldana's green-skinned no-nonsense warrior, and a bluish-grey muscleman whose failure to grasp metaphor is comic gold: "Nothing goes over my head; my reflexes are too fast."

From The Guardian ● Jul. 24, 2014

Inside the Sistine Chapel, where in the past I have been shoved and elbowed by the crowds, about 30 spectators were awing over Perugino’s frescoes and craning to see Michelangelo’s burly musclemen on the ceiling.

From New York Times ● Jun. 25, 2021

I can relate to these crypt-dwellers somehow, chatty and powerless in a world of snarling musclemen.

From The New Yorker ● Apr. 29, 2019

It is hard to argue against that, but if you take the movie for what it is – a modernized version of mid-century musclemen silliness – the exercise makes a little more sense.

From The Guardian ● Dec. 25, 2016

Last year at the Cannes Film Festival, Sylvester Stallone and his merry band of musclemen were rumbling down the Croisette in tanks to promote their film “The Expendables 3.”

From Washington Times ● May 17, 2015

When the Spanish got to Mexico they didn't understand what they saw, being musclemen rather than scholars.

From Adaptation by Schoenherr, John