assegai
UK/ˈæsəɡaɪ/
assegai noun: a slim hardwood spear or javelin with an iron tip, especially those used by Bantu peoples of Southern Africa.
Noun
assegai (plural assegais)
- A slim hardwood spear or javelin with an iron tip, especially those used by Bantu peoples of Southern Africa.
- But now the Moormen, stalking o'er the strand / to guard the wat'ery stores the strangers need; / this, targe on arm and assegai in hand, / that, with his bended bow, and venom'd reed[.]1880, Richard Francis Burton, Os Lusíadas, volume I, page 33
- My client welcomed the judge […] and they disappeared together into the Ethiopian card-room, which was filled with the assegais and exclamation point shields Mr. Cooke had had made at the sawmill at Beaverton.1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter VIII, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC
- The tree species Curtisia dentata, the wood of which is traditionally used to make assegais.
- In the clearing, built around the base of an assegai tree, stood a hut, plastered in cow dung.2019, Marlon James, Black Leopard, Red Wolf, Hamish Hamilton, page 236
Verb
assegai (third-person singular simple present assegais, present participle assegaiing, simple past and past participle assegaied)
- To spear with an assegai.
assegai meaning in Arabic
assegai in Arabic
- slim hardwood spear or javelin with an iron tip
- زَغَايَة zaḡāya
Examples of assegai in a sentence
- Native mats covered the clay walls; a collection of spears, assegais, shields, knives was hung up in trophies.1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The...
- A birdchief, bluestreaked and feathered in war panoply with his assegai, striding through a crackling canebrake over beechmast and acorns.1922, James Joyce, Ulysses:
- Without a word, he took my foreskin, pulled it forward, and then, in a single motion, brought down his assegai.1994, Nelson Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela, London: Abacus, published 2010, page 32:
Forms of assegai
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | assegais |
| alternative form (obsolete) | assagai |
| alternative form (obsolete) | assagaie |
| alternative form (obsolete) | assagay |
| alternative form (obsolete) | assegaai |
| alternative form (obsolete) | assegay |
| alternative form (obsolete) | azagaia |
| alternative form (obsolete) | hassagay |
| alternative form (obsolete) | hassaguay |
| alternative form (obsolete) | zagaie |
| alternative form (obsolete) | zagaye |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | assegais |
| present participle | assegaiing |
| past participle | assegaied |
| past | assegaied |
Origin of assegai
From French azagaie (now zagaie) or Portuguese azagaia, Spanish azagaya, and later in the forms that have become most common borrowed from Afrikaans assegaai, from colloquial Arabic اَلزَّغَايَة (az-zaḡāya), from Proto-Berber *zaġāya (“spear”).
Questions about assegai
- What does assegai mean?
- Assegai means a slim hardwood spear or javelin with an iron tip, especially those used by Bantu peoples of Southern Africa.
- What is assegai in Arabic?
- Assegai in Arabic is زَغَايَة (zaḡāya). See Assegai meaning in Arabic.
- How do you use assegai in a sentence?
- Native mats covered the clay walls; a collection of spears, assegais, shields, knives was hung up in trophies.
- What part of speech is assegai?
- Assegai can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce assegai?
- Assegai is pronounced /ˈæsəɡaɪ/ (UK).
- What is the plural of assegai?
- The plural of assegai is assegais.
Words near assegai in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: assegai (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Cite this entry: “assegai.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/assegai. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.