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Assegai   Listen
Assegai

noun
1.
The slender spear of the Bantu-speaking people of Africa.  Synonym: assagai.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Assegai" Quotes from Famous Books



... Dutch East India Company's settlement at the Cape of Good Hope. The facts are preserved for us by the diary which Commander Van Riebeck was ordered to keep for the information of his employers. Under the date October 19th, 1653, we read that David Janssen, a herdsman, was found lying dead of assegai wounds, inflicted by the Beechranger Hottentots, while the cattle placed under his charge were seen disappearing round the curve of the Lion's Head. The theft had been successfully accomplished through the perfidy of a certain "Harry," a Hottentot chief, who was living on terms of friendship ...
— Lord Milner's Work in South Africa - From its Commencement in 1897 to the Peace of Vereeniging in 1902 • W. Basil Worsfold

... close combat, the straight kris for thrusting and cutting, and the waved, serpent-like kris for thrusting only. They are dexterous in the use of arms, and can most skilfully decapitate a foe at a single stroke. At sea they use a sort of assegai, called bagsacay or simbilin, about half an inch in diameter, with a sharp point. Some can throw as many as four at a time, and make them spread in the flight; they use these for boarding vessels. They make many of ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman

... warfare were peculiar and somewhat drastic, but most effective. As he conquered a tribe, he enrolled its remnants in his army, so that they might in their turn help to conquer others. He armed his regiments with the short stabbing assegai, instead of the throwing assegai which they had been accustomed to use, and kept them subject to an iron discipline. If a man was observed to show the slightest hesitation about coming to close quarters with the enemy, he was executed as soon ...
— Cetywayo and his White Neighbours - Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal • H. Rider Haggard

... poniard, stiletto, stylet[obs3], dudgeon, bayonet; sword-bayonet, sword-stick; side arms, foil, blade, steel; ax, bill; pole-ax, battle-ax; gisarme[obs3], halberd, partisan, tomahawk, bowie knife[obs3]; ataghan[obs3], attaghan[obs3], yataghan[obs3]; yatacban[obs3]; assagai, assegai[obs3]; good sword, trusty sword, naked sword; cold steel. club, mace, truncheon, staff, bludgeon, cudgel, life preserver, shillelah, sprig; hand staff, quarter staff; bat, cane, stick, knuckle duster; billy, blackjack, sandbag, waddy[obs3]. gun, piece[Fr]; firearms; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... a lower mental level than the Arab who respects the salt, or the Brahmin who preserves the caste. And in this quarrel we have a right to come with scimitars as well as sabres, with bows as well as rifles, with assegai and tomahawk and boomerang, because there is in all these at least a seed of civilization that these intellectual anarchists would kill. And if they should find us in our last stand girt with such strange swords and following unfamiliar ensigns and ask us for what we fight in ...
— New York Times, Current History, Vol 1, Issue 1 - From the Beginning to March, 1915 With Index • Various

... window. Slipping from the bed, I felt for my pistol, as it was quite dark, crept to the window, opened it, and keeping my head below the level of the sill, fearing lest its appearance should be greeted with an assegai, asked ...
— Marie - An Episode in The Life of the late Allan Quatermain • H. Rider Haggard



Words linked to "Assegai" :   spear, lance, shaft



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