pugilist

plural pugilists

1. One who fights with their fists, feet, or both, especially a boxer and especially a professional prizefighter.First known use 1790

   Near-synonyms: boxer, prizefighter (both often synonymous)

   4 more examples

   I laugh and hoot at ye, ye cricket-players, ye pugilists, ye deaf Burkes and blind Bendigoes!

   1851, Herman Melville, Moby Dick

   But this did not enter my mind at the moment, as groaning with rage I ransacked the kitchen for something better than a broom. Then, canceling my search, I dashed out of the house with the heroic decision of attacking him barefisted; despite my natural vigor, I am no pugilist, while the short but broad-shouldered Maximovich seemed made of pig iron.

   1955 September 15, Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita, Paris: The Olympia Press […], →OCLC

   The man's mind conjured up an eidetic memory from his childhood, when he was his son's age, living in a kampong in Choa Chu Kang with his parents and other relatives. He and a few younger male cousins were playing a game of sword battle between good and evil martial arts pugilists, near the zinc-roof wooden house, close to the chicken cages. Their parents were inside the house, chatting and enjoying their siestas after the morning labors in the field.

   2006, O Thiam Chin, “Fathers and Sons”, in Free-Falling Man, iUniverse, →ISBN, page 39

   In 1925, boxer shorts were unleashed on the world: loose-fitting underwear for men, featuring an elastic waistband inspired by the shorts worn by boxers. It was underwear for the inner pugilist.

   2018 August 9, Alan Burdick, “Science has Resolved the Question of Boxers vs. Briefs”, in The New Yorker, archived from the original on 09 Nov 2020

   Synonyms: pug, boxer, prizefighter

2. figurativelyOne who engages in rhetorical attacks, for himself or on behalf of another.

   President Nixon tried to make leaders of communist bloc countries believe he was a volatile, irrational pugilist.

   2025 April 16, Laurent Belsie, “Why Trump’s ‘madman theory’ tactics could run aground amid trade reversals”, in The Christian Science Monitor, archived from the original on 18 Apr 2025

   4 more examples

   President Obama's style leaves liberal activists in the Democratic Party cold. They prefer a pugilist fighting for principle over a pragmatist agreeing to compromises. Can the president reignite the enthusiasm of his party's core supporters by November?

   2010, Kirk Victor, National Journal, volume 42, number 35, page 4

   A pugilist for the modern movement in the arts, [Edith] Sitwell was often in demand as a speaker, and she could fill a room. On 8 May 1923, she debated with the poet Alfred Noyes at the London School of Economics to raise money for the Hospitals of London Appeal. Sitwell associated Noyes with J. C. Squire and once remarked that his work was like cheap linoleum: 'they have the same kind of smoothness!' Edmund Gosse, the chairman, asked Noyes beforehand to take it easy: '"'Do not, I beg of you, use a weaver's beam on the head of poor Edith."" Noyes did win the opening round. Sitwell, wearing gold laurels, asked if she could bring her supporters to the platform; Noyes agreed on the condition that he could bring his. When asked who they were, he answered blandly, '"Oh, Virgil, Horace, Dante, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Wordsworth, and a few others." Sitwell opened her lecture, 'In their day, Keats and Shelley were the most persecuted of poets, and Tom Moore was the most popular. In our days, my brothers and I are the most persecuted of poets, and,' pointing an accusing finger at her opponent, 'Mr Noyes..." At that point laughter drowned out her words. She went on to deliver a scripted talk on how all great poets are innovators in their time and that she was glad to join them in the asylum to which their contemporaries assigned them.

   2011, Richard Greene, “Chapter 12: Gertrude”, in Edith Sitwell: Avant Garde Poet, English Genius, Little, Brown, →ISBN

   Matthew Poole (1624-1679) was a zealous Presbyterian whose acumen as a biblical commentator was admired across the confessional divide in England. Born in York, Poole entered Emmanuel College, Cambridge, in July 1645; his theological acuity was widely recognized. Upon graduation in 1649, Poole took the rectory at St. Michael-le-Querne. It was a living belonging to Anthony Tuckney, the master at Emmanuel while Poole had been a student. Formally adopting a Presbyterian ecclesial identity and enlisting himself as a pugilist for the cause of orthodoxy, which was sine qua non in the task of completing what was then known as "the second Reformation," Poole responded to Biddle's antitrinitarian heresy and published ΒΛΑΣΦΗΜΟΚΤΟΝΙΑ: The Blasphemer Slaine with the Sword of the Spirit in 1653. It proved to be an influential text, requiring his publisher, fellow Presbyterian John Rothwell, to publish the second and revised edition in 1654. As is to be expected from a man steeped in philology and text-critical studies, Poole offered a trenchant critique of Biddle. Again, similar to Nicholas Estwick, the focus was on shoring up the deity of the Holy Spirit.

   2012, Paul C. H. Lim, “Many Weapons, One Aim”, in Mystery Unveiled: The Crisis of the Trinity in Early Modern England (Oxford Studies in Historical Theology), Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 157

   Mr. Patel has a long record as a fierce pugilist for Mr. Trump, pushing some of the pro-Trump orbit’s most dubious theories[.]

   2025 January 31, Cameron Joseph, “Why Republicans blasted Tulsi Gabbard and RFK Jr. – and bear-hugged Kash Patel”, in The Christian Science Monitor, archived from the original on 11 Feb 2025