stramazoun

plural stramazouns · alternative stramazon

1. obsoleteA direct descending blow with the sword edge.

   Thy fincture, carricade, and sly passata, Thy stramazon, and resolute stoccata.

   1855, Charles Kingsley, Westward Ho!: Or, The Voyages and Adventures of Sir Amyas Leigh, Knight, […], volume I, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Macmillan & Co., →OCLC, page 96

   2 more examples

   But I (being loth to take the deadly advauntage that lay before mee of his left ſide) made a kind of stramazoun, ran him vp to the hilts, through the Doublet, through the Shirt, and yet miſt the skin.

   1599 (first performance), B. I. [i.e., Ben Jonson], The Comicall Satyre of Euery Man out of His Humor. […], London: […] [Adam Islip] for William Holme, […], published 1600, →OCLC, Act IV, scene iii, signature N, recto

   There were others that made it their glory to pass for Hectors, sons of Priam, brothers of the blade; and talked of nothing but attacks, combats, reverses, stramazons, stoccados;[…]

   1947, Francisco de Quevedo, “The Visions: The Lovers' Madhouse”, in Roger L'Estrange et al., transl., Quevedo: the choice humorous and satirical works, page 250

   Synonyms: estramacon