sepoy

plural sepoys

1. historicalgovernmentA native soldier of the East Indies, employed in the service of a European colonial power, notably the British India army (first under the British-chartered East India Company, later in the crown colony), but also France and Portugal.

   If our door were in the hands of the Sepoys the place must fall, and the women and children be treated as they were in Cawnpore.

   1890 February, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “The Strange Story of Jonathan Small”, in The Sign of Four (Standard Library), London: Spencer Blackett […], →OCLC, page 238

   1 more example

   They proved to be the wives of a body of sepoys, also from the 5th Regiment of Bombay Native Infantry; the sepoys had perished, and their families been enslaved, when their pattamar had been captured by the Qawasim some months before.

   1997, Charles E. Davies, The Blood-red Arab Flag: An Investigation Into Qasimi Piracy, 1797-1820, University of Exeter Press, →ISBN, page 312

2. IndiaNepalPakistanThe holder of an infantry enlisted rank equivalent to private in other countries.