| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000. |
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| ambush |
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| SYLLABICATION: | am·bush |
| PRONUNCIATION: |   m b sh |
| NOUN: | 1. The act of lying in wait to attack by surprise. 2. A sudden attack made from a concealed position. 3a. Those hiding in order to attack by surprise. b. The hiding place used for this. 4. A hidden peril or trap. | | TRANSITIVE VERB: | Inflected forms: am·bushed, am·bush·ing, am·bush·es
To attack from a concealed position. | | ETYMOLOGY: | Middle English embush, from Old French embusche, from embuschier, to ambush, from Frankish *boscu, bush, woods. | | OTHER FORMS: | ambush er —NOUN
| | SYNONYMS: | ambush, ambuscade, bushwhack, waylay These verbs mean to attack suddenly and without warning from a concealed place: guerrillas ambushing a platoon; highway robbers ambuscading a stagecoach; a patrol bushwhacked by poachers; a truck waylaid by robbers.
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| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by the Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. |
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