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hus·sar

(hə-zär, -sär)

1. A horseman of the Hungarian light cavalry organized during the 1400s.

2. A member of any of similar, ornately uniformed European units of light cavalry.

[Hungarian huszár, of Slavic origin; akin to Serbian Church Slavonic husarĭ, highwayman, raider, and Serbo-Croatian husa, plundering, invasion, trap, both from Proto-Slavic *xǫsa, raiding, robbery, band of robbers, of Germanic origin; akin to Gothic hansa and Old English hōs, troop, band, and Middle Low German hanse, hanse.]

Indo-European & Semitic Roots Appendices

Thousands of entries in the dictionary include etymologies that trace their origins back to reconstructed proto-languages. You can obtain more information about these forms in our online appendices:

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Semitic Roots

The Indo-European appendix covers nearly half of the Indo-European roots that have left their mark on English words. A more complete treatment of Indo-European roots and the English words derived from them is available in our Dictionary of Indo-European Roots.

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