pyrate

Noun

pirate (plural pirates)

1. A criminal who plunders at sea; commonly attacking merchant vessels, though often pillaging port towns.
   • You should be cautious due to the Somali pirates.

   Synonyms:

   buccaneer, corsair, sea-robber

2. An armed ship or vessel that sails for the purpose of plundering other vessels.
   • How did you do it? Have you searched for hidden treasure, or discovered a pole, or done time on a pirate, or flown the Channel, or what? Where is the glamour of romance? How did you get it?1912, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Lost World […], London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC
3. (broadly) One who breaks intellectual property laws by reproducing protected works without permission.
   • And Gnutella, Freenet and other pirate tools will offer plunderings beyond Fanning's fantasies.2001, unidentified insider, quoted in John Alderman, Sonic Boom: Napster, MP3, and the New Pioneers of Music, Da Capo Press, page 178

   Synonyms:

   bootlegger

4. A bird which practises kleptoparasitism.
5. A kind of marble in children's games.
   • Most of the time it went fine; some of his classmates had so many marbles they could have opened up their own shop in smurfs, pirates, purple aggies and pink panthers.1999, Abdelkader Benali, Susan Massotty, Wedding by the Sea, page 60

See all 13 meanings of pirate