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saboteur

UK/ˌsæbəˈtɜː(ɹ)/US/ˌsæbəˈtɜː(ɹ)/
nounC1Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #10,342 of 15,258neutral

Other forms: saboteurs

A saboteur is somebody who deliberately wrecks work or equipment. Catch the saboteur, wartime saboteurs, an internal saboteur.

In war it names a respected trade, since a saboteur behind enemy lines was doing what an army sent them to do. In an office it is an accusation about somebody quietly wrecking a project from inside.

Definitions of saboteur

  1. 1nounsaboteurSomebody who deliberately wrecks work or equipment.C1

    “A saboteur cut the brake cables on the company's delivery vans.”

saboteur is a person.

Where it comes from

  1. French

    saboteur

  2. English, today

    saboteur

Borrowed from French saboteur.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practise this word

saboteur in the wild

  • One who engages in sabotage is a saboteur.

    Sabotage

  • The plan involved eight German saboteurs who had previously spent time in the United States.

    Operation Pastorius

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.