ROBBER

Pronunciation (US): (GB):

I. (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A thief who steals from someone by threatening violence

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Hypernyms ("robber" is a kind of...):

stealer; thief (a criminal who takes property belonging to someone else with the intention of keeping it or selling it)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "robber"):

bank robber (a robber of banks)

mugger (a robber who takes property by threatening or performing violence on the person who is robbed (usually on the street))

Derivation:

rob (take something away by force or without the consent of the owner)

Credits

Context examples:

I had no occasion of bribing, flattering, or pimping, to procure the favour of any great man, or of his minion; I wanted no fence against fraud or oppression: here was neither physician to destroy my body, nor lawyer to ruin my fortune; no informer to watch my words and actions, or forge accusations against me for hire: here were no gibers, censurers, backbiters, pickpockets, highwaymen, housebreakers, attorneys, bawds, buffoons, gamesters, politicians, wits, splenetics, tedious talkers, controvertists, ravishers, murderers, robbers, virtuosos; no leaders, or followers, of party and faction; no encouragers to vice, by seducement or examples; no dungeon, axes, gibbets, whipping-posts, or pillories; no cheating shopkeepers or mechanics; no pride, vanity, or affectation; no fops, bullies, drunkards, strolling whores, or poxes; no ranting, lewd, expensive wives; no stupid, proud pedants; no importunate, overbearing, quarrelsome, noisy, roaring, empty, conceited, swearing companions; no scoundrels raised from the dust upon the merit of their vices, or nobility thrown into it on account of their virtues; no lords, fiddlers, judges, or dancing-masters.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

One thin envelope, from a robber magazine, contained for twenty-two dollars.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Tonight, when the robbers are all asleep, we will flee together.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

“The proper life for a robber!” roared Hordle John, in his thundering voice.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Some account of them and of their appearance was in the papers, and would naturally occur to anyone who wished to invent a story in which imaginary robbers should play a part.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

You appear to take it for granted that, although the door was forced, the robber never got in.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Come!” Receiving no answer to these taunts, he would mount in his wrath to the words “swindlers” and “robbers”; and these being ineffectual too, would sometimes go to the extremity of crossing the street, and roaring up at the windows of the second floor, where he knew Mr. Micawber was.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

"—"Are there robbers?

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

And robbers and robbed drank together, amicably agreeing that the battle was to the strong, and that the fifteen dollars for "The Peri and the Pearl" belonged by right to The Hornet's editorial staff.