desperado

Etymology

From Spanish desperado, past participle of desperar, archaic form of desesperar (“to despair”), from Latin disperare (“to despair, to lose hope”), from prefix dis- + sperare (“to hope”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /dɛspəˈɹɑːdəʊ/

Noun

desperado (plural desperadoes or desperados)

1. A bold outlaw, especially one from southern portions of the Wild West.
   • 1850, Thomas Carlyle, Latter-Day Pamphlets, The present time

     The kind of persons who excite or give signal to such revolutions — students, young men of letters […], or fierce and justly bankrupt desperadoes, acting everywhere on the discontent of the millions and blowing it into flame, — might give rise to reflections as to the character of our epoch.

   • 1918, Willa Cather, My Antonia, Mirado Modern Classics, paperback edition, page 6

     Surely this was the face of a desperado.

2. (chess) A piece that seems determined to give itself up, typically to bring about stalemate or perpetual check.

Etymology

From Spanish desperado (“desperate person”), past participle of desperar, archaic form of desesperar (“to despair”)

Noun

desperado c (singular definite desperadoen, plural indefinite desperados or desperadoer)

1. desperado (outlaw)

See also

• desperat

References

• “desperado” in Den Danske Ordbog

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /despeˈɾado/, [d̪espeˈɾaðo]

Adjective

desperado (feminine singular desperada, masculine plural desperados, feminine plural desperadas)

1. Obsolete form of desesperado.

Verb

desperado

1. masculine singular of the past participle of desperar

Further reading

• “desperado” in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014.