Giaour
Definition, Meaning & Examples
Pronunciation /ˈd͡ʒaʊə/ · Part of speech noun
Quick meaning: Giaour is a noun meaning (religious slur) A non-Muslim, especially a Christian, an infidel; especially as used by Turkish people with particular reference to Christians such as Greeks, Armenians, Bulgarians, Serbs and Assyrians.
Meaning
(religious slur) A non-Muslim, especially a Christian, an infidel; especially as used by Turkish people with particular reference to Christians such as Greeks, Armenians, Bulgarians, Serbs and Assyrians.
Example Sentences
And far beyond the Moslem's power / Had wrong'd him with the faithless Giaour.
We men are not a race of freebooters or giaours; not when our argosies are prey and food to the evil fish-of-metal whose lair is a German U-boat.
I shudder in delight when I think of two-hundred-year-old books, dating back to the time of Tamerlane, volumes for which acquisitive giaours gleefully relinquish gold pieces and which they carry all the way back to their own countries[…].
Byron’s tale called The Giaour is supposed to be told by a Turkish fisherman who had been employed all the day in the gulf of Ægi’na, and landed his boat at night-fall on the Piræus, now called the harbor of Port Leonê.[…]The tale is this: Leilah, the beautiful concubine of the Caliph Hasson^([sic]), falls in love with a giaour, flees from the seraglio, is overtaken by an emir, put to death, and cast into the sea. The giaour cleaves Hassan’s skull, flees for his life, and becomes a monk.
Word Forms
- giaours
Synonyms for giaour
Depending on context, synonyms include kafir.
Related Words
Related dictionary entries include gorjer, gaour, gajo, gypsy, gurdwara-goer, gaje.
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Sources & Attribution
FreeDictionaryAPI.com / Wiktionary · Original source · CC BY-SA 4.0
Dictionary data is provided by FreeDictionaryAPI.com and sourced from Wiktionary under its stated license.