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Vamoose Has Wild West Origins
In the 1820s and '30s, the American Southwest was rough-and-tumble territory—the true Wild West. English-speaking cowboys, Texas Rangers, and gold prospectors regularly rubbed elbows with Spanish-speaking vaqueros in the local saloons, and a certain amount of linguistic intermixing was inevitable. One Spanish term that caught on with English speakers was vamos, which means "let's go." Cowpokes and dudes alike adopted the word, at first using a range of spellings and pronunciations that varied considerably in their proximity to the original Spanish form. But when the dust settled, the version most American English speakers were using was vamoose.
Synonyms
- bail
- bail out
- begone
- book [slang]
- bug off
- bug out
- bugger off [British slang]
- buzz (off)
- clear off [chiefly British]
- clear out
- cut out
- depart
- dig out
- exit
- get
- get off
- go
- go off
- move
- pack (up or off)
- part
- peel off
- pike (out or off)
- pull out
- push off
- push on
- quit
- run along
- sally (forth)
- scarper [British]
- shove (off)
- step (along)
- take off
- walk out
Examples of vamoose in a Sentence
David Quammen, The New Yorker, 4 May 2020
Nearby, a woman was making her own bathroom right next to the entrance of a residential building, vamoosing only when the doorman, Clever Santos Chavez, chased her away.
—Washington Post, 24 Feb. 2020
In November, the owner of the building housing Trump’s SoHo hotel in Manhattan paid the Trump Organization to vamoose.
—Chas Danner, Daily Intelligencer, 27 Jan. 2018
The Senate left town for its August recess Thursday, a week after the House vamoosed, and let’s hope the Members get an earful from constituents at home.
—The Editorial Board, WSJ, 4 Aug. 2017
Articles Related to vamoose
Dictionary Entries Near vamoose
Cite this Entry
“Vamoose.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/vamoose. Accessed 30 Dec. 2024.
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