Forms: 5–6 enbusshe, embushe, 6– ambush. Occas. weakened in 4– to abush, ’bush. [a. OFr. embusche, f. vb. embuscher: see AMBUSH v. Nearly equivalent words from the pa. pple. of Fr., Sp., It., are ENBUSCHY, AMBUSCADO, AMBUSCADE, EMBOSCATA, IMBOSCATA. The change from em- to am- (which appears to have begun with this word c. 1550, and thence extended to its cognates, including even embuscade from Fr.) is not accounted for; it was perh. due to the influence of words like ambages.]
1. strictly. A military disposition consisting of troops concealed in a wood or other place, in order to surprise and fall unexpectedly upon an enemy. The ambush is the entire strategic arrangement or trap; but sometimes the posture, sometimes the place, sometimes the troops, are the prominent part of the idea. Often in phr. To make, construct, lay an ambush; lie in ambush. (As a formal military term AMBUSCADE is now used.)
[c. 1380. Sir Ferumb., 2887. Þan schullaþ our men … breken out of þe bossche.]
1489. Caxton, Faytes of Armes, I. i. 4. And made an enbusshe for the better to vaynquisshe theym.
1560. Bible (Genev.), 1 Macc. ix. 40 (1590). Then Ionathans men that lay in ambush rose vp.
1600. Hakluyt, Voy., III. 406. The inhabitants of this Isle … layed an ambush for him.
1653. Holcroft, Procopius, 109. He layd ambushes upon the way, to cut them off as they fled.
1776. McIntosh, in Sparks’ Corr. Am. Rev., I. 168. I placed … ambushes in the different roads leading to it.
1870. Bryant, Homer, I. VI. 191. He chose … The bravest men to be in ambush for him.
† 2. The force (pl. troops) so disposed, liers in wait. Obs.
1489. Caxton, Faytes of Armes, I. xvi. 48. Sawted on the sydes by som embushe.
1587. Myrr. for Mag., Albanact, xiii. 1. By night the ambushe … Came forth from woods.
1653. Holcroft, Procopius, III. 111. The Ambushes rose, and put themselves between them and the Town.
3. Any disposition of persons (or of a single person) lying in wait.
[c. 1386. Chaucer, Knts. T., 659. This Palamon Was in a busshe [v.r. bosch] that no man myhte hym se.]
1573. Twyne, Æneid., VII. (R.). In secret ambush I, in yonder wood … my selfe entend to hide.
1593. Shaks., Rich. II., I. i. 137. Once I did lay an ambush for your life.
1747. Gray, Ode to Eton Coll., lviii. Show them where in ambush stand To seize their prey, the murth’rous band!
4. fig.
1592. Greene, Groatsw. Wit (1617), 13. That rich ambush of amber colored darts [a Lady’s hair], whose points are leueld against his heart.
1633. Herbert, Ch. Milit., 66, in Temple, 185. Who by an ambush lost his Paradise.
1642. Fuller, Holy & Prof. St., I. ix. 22. Lest some unseen ambushes should surprise his conscience.
1751. Johnson, Rambler, No. 183, ¶ 6. He that perishes in the ambushes of envy.
1852. H. Rogers, Ess., I. vii. 395. To forewarn the mind itself of the points in which an ambush of error may be suspected.
¶ By confusion for AMBAGES.
1602. Fulbecke, 1st Pt. Parall., 76. For the more ful & forcible destruction of delayes & ambushes in pleading.
