| 释义 |
samurai|ˈsæmʊraɪ|
Pl. samurai, occas. samurais.
[Japanese.]
1. a. In Japan during the continuance of the feudal system, one of the class of military retainers of the daimios; sometimes in wider sense, a member of the military caste, whether a samurai proper or a daimio. Also applied to any Japanese army officer. Also attrib.
1727J. Scheuchzer tr. Kaempfer's Hist. Japan II. i. 396 'Tis from thence they are call'd Samurai, which signifies persons who wear two swords. 1795tr. C. P. Thunberg's Trav. Europe, Afr., & Asia (ed. 2) III. 123 The people in office at this place, who wore two sabres, were called Samrai. 1841Chinese Repository X. 17 Class 4 is that of the samorai, or military, and consists of the vassals of the nobility. 1874M. E. Herbert tr. Hübner's Ramble ii. i. (1878) 222 He has..his vassals, his Samurais, or knights with two swords (the others having only one). 1885E. Greey Bakin's Capt. Love ii. (1904) 14 Amada, who had been a samurai, taught the lad to read and write. Ibid. iv. 30 For a samurai woman, even when mortally wounded, always endeavours to conceal her pain. 1896L. Hearn Kokoro x. 172 The fear of the dead was held not less contemptible in a samurai than the fear of man. 1898, etc. [see bushido]. 1904, etc. [see heimin]. 1906Sladen Lovers in Japan vi, Mr. Jevons told us that we ought to have Samurai servants. 1972Mainichi Daily News (Japan) 6 Nov. 7/7 The Samurai were distinguished in dress most easily by the swords they wore.
b. transf. and fig.
1905H. G. Wells Mod. Utopia ix. 259 These people constitute an order, the samurai, the ‘voluntary nobility’, which is essential in the scheme of the Utopian State. 1918G. Frankau One of Them xx. 151 Stern mitred prelates; Law-lords; back-woods Samurais Who flung to consequence a scornful ‘Damn your eyes’. 1934H. G. Wells Exper. Autobiogr. II. ix. 735, I have told already..how I tried to make the Fabian Society into an order of the Samurai. 1977Time 24 Jan. 17/2 Yukio Mishima, the right-wing literary samurai who committed spectacular hara-kiri in 1970.
2. attrib. and Comb., as samurai code, samurai ethic, samurai order, samurai spirit, samurai sword, samurai warrior; samurai-minded adj.
1971Times Lit. Suppl. 20 Aug. 984/1 The *samurai code embraced more than the practice of Zen and the ethics of Japanese forms of Confucianism.
1970Newsweek 7 Dec. 32/2 The Japanese militarists of the 1930s twisted the ancient *samurai ethic into the ideology of Fascism.
1938Times 17 Feb. 16/1 In private conversation business men will unequivocally express disapproval of the course of events, a minority of *samurai-minded ultra-patriots being the only exceptions.
1906G. B. Shaw Let. 24 Mar. (1972) II. 614 A proposal for a set of observances of the *Samurai order.
1923*Samurai spirit [see bushido].
1961I. Murdoch Severed Head xix. 155 Was it..when I saw her cut the napkins in two with the *Samurai sword?
1977National Observer (U.S.) 15 Jan. 5 Hayakawa..went on to even more fame as the ‘*samurai warrior’ president of San Francisco State University. |