Example Sentences
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Recent Examples of corsair
If peaceable trading isn't your dream, consider the corsair life, pillaging other ships for their precious cargo.
—
Alan Bradley, Space.com, 7 Oct. 2025
Set in 1492, the series follows Sara, the defiant daughter of Granada’s chief Rabbi, exiled during Spain’s expulsion of its Jewish population and captured by Ottoman corsairs (‘Korsan’ in Turkish).
—Ben Croll, Variety, 29 Sep. 2025
Vex have new units called Kobolds, Fallen have flying corsairs.
—Paul Tassi, Forbes.com, 6 May 2025
In 1544, Barbarossa, a corsair who had risen to become admiral of the Ottoman navy, raided the island and carried away into slavery almost a thousand inhabitants—practically the island’s entire population.
—Lee Marshall, Travel + Leisure, 15 Apr. 2025
But the stealthy corsair, evading her pursuer, slipped to safety in Tripoli’s shallow harbor—and then, suddenly, disaster struck the Philadelphia.
—Mark G. Spencer, WSJ, 31 Jan. 2023
Queen of the seas, Britain seemed to countenance the pirating activities of the North African corsairs.
—Thomas Wendel, National Review, 4 July 2019
Freed from a Mediterranean Sea crowded with Ottoman fleets and North African corsairs, the Atlantic upstarts unleashed themselves on the world’s oceans.
—Jeremy Adelman, Foreign Affairs, 20 Apr. 2015
Recent Examples of Synonyms for corsair
pirate
Noun
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These oil fields basically are pirate operations.—
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Notorious pirate Jean Lafitte frequented neighboring Grand Terre Island in the early 1800s.—
Cite this Entry
“Corsair.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/corsair. Accessed 13 Jan. 2026.
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