ambush

1 of 2

verb

am·​bush ˈam-ˌbu̇sh 

ambushed; ambushing; ambushes

transitive verb

1

: to attack by surprise from a hidden place : waylay

Our troops ambushed the enemy units.

… his caravan that season had been ambushed and shot at twice on the way down …

—Rudyard Kipling

2

: to station in ambush (see ambush entry 2 sense 2)

Mr and Mrs Fyne ambushed at their window—a most incredible occupation for people of their kind—saw with renewed anxiety a cab come to the door.

—Joseph Conrad

intransitive verb

: to lie in wait : lurk

ambusher noun

ambushment

ˈam-ˌbu̇sh-mənt 

noun

ambush

2 of 2

noun

plural ambushes

1

: a trap in which one or more concealed attackers lie in wait to attack by surprise

soldiers caught in an ambush

Suddenly a shout comes down the line: "Contact front!" It's an ambush, with gunmen on both sides of the road.

—Lev Grossman

… it is plain he must have been as stupid with weariness as myself, and looked as little where we were going, or we should not have walked into an ambush like blind men.

—Robert Louis Stevenson

2

: the concealed position from which a surprise attack is made

a group of soldiers lying in ambush

… tanks alone are vulnerable to opposing infantry with antitank weapons, particularly at night when the infantry can more easily wait in ambush or approach unseen.

—Neil Sheehan

also : an individual or group concealed for a surprise attack

All was then dead silence; for, loquacious as he was on other occasions, Captain Dalgetty knew well the necessity of an ambush keeping itself under covert.

—Robert Burns

3

: the act of approaching or confronting someone with something unexpected

—often used before another noun

ambush journalism

… did not return calls or e-mails and was hostile when a television crew conducted an ambush interview several years ago.

—Neely Tucker

Synonyms

Verb

• ambuscade
• surprise
• surprize
• waylay

Noun

• ambuscade
• ambushment
• surprise
• surprize
• trap

Examples of ambush in a Sentence

Verb

We have reports of enemy soldiers ambushing civilians on this road.

the king's enemies planned to ambush the royal coach on the way to Paris and capture the king

Noun

Many soldiers were killed in the ambush.

The soldiers were lying in ambush, waiting for the enemy to approach.

a snake waiting in ambush for its next meal

Recent Examples on the Web

Verb

The large nonvenomous constrictor captures its prey by ambushing it before coiling around it. —Julia Jacobo, ABC News, 25 Oct. 2024

Guerrillas ambushed enemies, one former rebel told me, and finished them off with axes or knives before stealing their weapons. —Sean Williams, Harper's Magazine, 23 Sep. 2024

Noun

Castro said the sergeant, a 21-year veteran of the Fresno Police Department, and the other officers had spent about an hour searching for evidence of a shooting in the neighborhood east of downtown Fresno when the ambush occurred. —Bill Hutchinson, ABC News, 28 Oct. 2024

Seeing the people flee north, Harney feared his cavalry had insufficient time to set the ambush. —Tim Madigan, Smithsonian Magazine, 22 Oct. 2024

Word History

Etymology

Verb

Middle English enbuschen "to place in hiding in order to attack by surprise, to hide (oneself) in order to attack by surprise," borrowed from Anglo-French embuscher "to place (in the woods) in order to attack by surprise, conceal, lie in wait to attack by surprise" (also continental Old French [Normandy & Picardy] embuschier, Picard dialect embusquier), from em- em- + -buscher, verbal derivative of Picard bus, busc "forest, grove," going back to Old Low Franconian *būska-, going back to Germanic, ablaut variant of *buska- "bush, thicket" — more at bush entry 1

Note: Forms with initial am- instead of em-, which first appear in the noun in the sixteenth century and the verb in the seventeenth century, are of uncertain origin. Given the earlier use in nouns, their appearance may be a by-product of shift of stress to the initial syllable. The suggestion in the Oxford English Dictionary, third edition, that the change is due to association with ambage, does not seem very likely. — The meaning "forest, grove" attached to *būska-, whence the Picard masculine noun bus, busc, receded early before a Gallo-Romance derivative *buska, a re-formation of the Germanic etymon as a neuter collective plural noun, taken as feminine, whence Old French busche "piece of firewood," French bûche. This new formation, also with results in Occitan and Upper Italian dialects, represents a sense shift from "bush, thicket" to "wood collected for a fire" to "split piece of wood, splinter." For a detailed discussion of Romance and Germanic outcomes of būska- see Johannes Hubschmied, "Romanisch-germanische Wortprobleme I. Zur Geschichte von bois, bûche (mit Berücksichtigung der Ortsnamen)," Vox Romanica, Band 29 (1970), pp. 114-16. Within the framework of Germanic and Indo-European ablaut patterns as now understood, a lengthened grade *būska- is questionable, and one might have to appeal to variation of expressive vocabulary within Germanic. Hubschmid, however, works within J. Pokorny's framework, where an Indo-European root with a very general meaning and form, *beu-, *b^heu-, *b^heuə- "to swell," is subject to an indefinite number of ablaut variants and root extensions.

Noun

earlier enbusshe, borrowed from Middle French embusche, embusque, noun derivative of embuschier "to place (in the woods) in order to attack by surprise" — more at ambush entry 1

Note: For the initial am- in place of em- see note at ambush entry 1

First Known Use

Verb

14th century, in the meaning defined at transitive sense 1

Noun

15th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Phrases Containing ambush

• in ambush

Kids Definition

ambush

1 of 2 verb

am·​bush ˈam-ˌbu̇sh 

: to attack from an ambush

ambush

2 of 2 noun

: a trap in which hidden persons wait to attack by surprise