Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use pirate in a sentence

40 example sentences · noun, verb, adjective

Pirate means a criminal who plunders at sea; commonly attacking merchant vessels, though often pillaging port towns. Example: “You should be cautious due to the Somali pirates.”

Examples of pirate by meaning

nounA criminal who plunders at sea; commonly attacking merchant vessels, though often pillaging port towns.

  • You should be cautious due to the Somali pirates.

nounAn armed ship or vessel that sails for the purpose of plundering other vessels.

  • Have you searched for hidden treasure, or discovered a pole, or done time on a pirate, or flown the Channel, or what?1912, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Lost World […], London; New York, N.Y.: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC
  • The third day out a pirate (Terebinthian by her rig) overhauled us, but when she saw us well armed she stood off after some shooting of arrows on either part—1952, C. S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

nounOne 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
  • They had watches that said Gucci or Rolex on them even though it was obvious they'd come straight here from some pirate factory in China.2004, David Lubar, Dunk, page 20

nounA 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

verbTo appropriate by piracy; to plunder at sea.

  • They pirated the tanker and sailed to a port where they could sell the ship and cargo.

verbTo create and/or sell an unauthorized copy of.

  • If a book is pirated there is a remedy for the author and publisher; if a photograph or an engraving is made of a picture without permission the law protects the painter.1904, Edward Elgar, in a speech on 4 July, 1904

verbTo knowingly obtain an unauthorized copy of.

  • Not willing to pay full price for the computer game, Heidi pirated a copy.
  • In the 1970s cable companies began to pirate some of the football games that the networks had contracted to televise.2002, John Sayle Watterson, College Football: History, Spectacle, Controversy, page 343
  • College students, with their limited budgets, often pirate software to save their money for buying more important items (like beer).2004, Wally Wang, Steal this File Sharing Book: What They Won't Tell You about File Sharing

verbTo engage in piracy.

  • He pirated in the Atlantic for years before becoming a privateer for the Queen.

More sentences with pirate

  • Delbert Wilkins is the most crucial pirate radio DJ in Brixton.From the entry crucial
  • The pirates buried their seizings and marked the map with an X.From the entry seizing
  • The pirates made him walk the plank, sent him down to Davy Jones.From the entry Davy Jones
  • He brandished his sword at the pirates.From the entry brandish
  • How do you know someone's a pirate? Because they arr.From the entry arr
  • So we played at being pirates for a while.From the entry play at
  • The pirates were searching for gold.From the entry gold
  • The plank along which pirates made their victims walk was a cantilever.2023 May 3, Philip Haigh, “The art and science of building bridges”, in RAIL, number 982, page 40. From the entry cantilever
  • He compared Gorsuch’s opinion to a pirate ship, flying the false flag of Scalian textualism.2022 March 20, Noah Feldman, “Scalia’s Ghost Is Haunting Conservative Justices”, in Bloomberg. From the entry Scalian
  • And our deepthroaters intimate that Max was friendly with many pirate clans.2018, Christopher Hinz, The Paratwa Saga: Liege-Killer, Ash Ock, and The Paratwa. From the entry deepthroater
  • When Asha threw the hair clip, the pirates jumped like flying fish to grab it.2016, Adam Guillain, Charlotte Guillain, edited by Catherine Coe, Yo Ho Ho! (Rising Stars Reading Planet), London: Rising Stars UK, Hodder…. From the entry yo-ho-ho
  • "We'll be splendid pirates!" cried Mrs Grinling as she swashed and buckled around the room.2016, Ronda Armitage, The Lighthouse Keeper: The Lighthouse Keeper's Breakfast. From the entry swash
  • He ran his ship a bit more iron-handedly than other pirate captains did.2014, Mary Lu Tyndall, The Redemption, →ISBN. From the entry iron-handedly
  • Bandits, raiders, and pirates have plagued civilized peoples around the globe for millennia.2013 Winter, Robert J. Bunker, "Defeating Violent Nonstate Actors," Strategic Studies Institute—U.S. Army War College (retrieved 24 May…. From the entry nonstate actor
  • You and your child are at the pirate ship park, tucked away in a gated area.2012, Laurie Kilmartin, Sh*tty Mom: The Parenting Guide for the Rest of Us, Abrams Image, →ISBN. From the entry textversation
  • Centuries ago Blackbeard the pirate false-flagged to entice lootful vessels to draw closer.2011, Mike Scott, Great American Youth: A True Saga, page 19. From the entry false flag
  • This was during the Ming Dynasty, when the seas around China were lousy with pirates.2011 September 7, “Matsu Islands”, in GlobalSecurity.org, archived from the original on 03 Dec 2011. From the entry Peikan
  • Pirate legends are still told in Chinpi, the most traditional village on Peikan Island.2011 September 7, “Matsu Islands”, in GlobalSecurity.org, archived from the original on 03 Dec 2011. From the entry Peikan
  • Pirate being somewhat funsize and me lanky, her feet just about reach my knees.2010, Lauren Laverne, “Bravery, Cunning and Feats of Daring Do”, in Candypop: Candy and the Broken Biscuits, HarperCollins Children’s…. From the entry funsize
  • I am sorry it didn’t involve spies or pirates or what have you.2009 October 29, David Walliams [pseudonym; David Edward Williams], Mr Stink, London: HarperCollins Children’s Books, →ISBN. From the entry what have you
  • Pirates are swinging on to the wreck, waving their swords about.2009 June 4, Cathy Cassidy, Shine On, Daizy Star, Penguin UK, →ISBN. From the entry kidsy
  • The Sea Angel was a massive ship shaped like a pirate ship.2008, J. Henry, Genie in My Lager, page 5. From the entry pirate ship
  • Some species of Terminus pirate drill through the ice crust to recover this natural alcohol.2008, BioWare, Mass Effect (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →ISBN, →OCLC, PC, scene: Antirumgon, Gagarin System…. From the entry anti-freeze
  • He did an imitation of a pirate: "Arr, Arr, Arr, me buckos."2007, Howard [A.] Norman, Devotion, Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin Company, →ISBN, page 90. From the entry arr
  • Paige and the pirate swashed their buckles, the witch's eyes sparkling with pleasure.2007, Scott Ciencin, Constance M. Burge, High Spirits, page 57. From the entry swash someone's buckle
  • Pirate spiders also feed on other spiders' eggs and on insects caught in their webs.2003, Astri Leroy, John Leroy, Spiders of Southern Africa, page 35. From the entry pirate spider
  • Coming to you live once a month, or whenever I feel like broadcasting a little pirate air.2001, Dana Stabenow, The Singing of the Dead, →ISBN, page 17. From the entry air
  • Resident breadbaker, librarian, Buffyatric, occasional pirate wench, and quondam Irish harper.1997 October 28, SjPete, “Stranger enters, goes to corner table”, in alt.pub.coffeehouse.amethyst (Usenet). From the entry Buffyatric

Meaning of pirate

  1. noun A criminal who plunders at sea; commonly attacking merchant vessels, though often pillaging port towns.
  2. noun An armed ship or vessel that sails for the purpose of plundering other vessels.
  3. noun One who breaks intellectual property laws by reproducing protected works without permission.

Full definition of pirate

Questions about pirate in a sentence

How do you use pirate in a sentence?
Pirate is used as a noun, verb and adjective. For example: “You should be cautious due to the Somali pirates.”
What is a short sentence with pirate?
“The pirates were searching for gold.”
What does pirate mean?
Pirate means a criminal who plunders at sea; commonly attacking merchant vessels, though often pillaging port towns.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: pirate (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this page: “How to use pirate in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/pirate. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.