assassin

From either French assassin or Italian assassino, from Arabic أَسَاسِيِّين (ʔasāsiyyīn, “people who are faithful to the foundation [of the faith]”) and the folkloric etymology Arabic حَشَّاشِين (ḥaššāšīn, “hashish users; low-lives”).

The mathematical sense was introduced by Bourbaki, playing on the notation ${\displaystyle \operatorname {Ass} (M)}$ and the fact that an associated prime is the annihilator of an element, and so is said to kill that element.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /əˈsæsɪn/

• Audio (UK)

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• Rhymes: -æsɪn

assassin (plural assassins)

1. (historical, usually capitalized) A member of the Nizari Ismaili Muslim community of the Alamut Period.
   • 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 29, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:

     The Assassines, a nation depending of Phœnicia, are esteemed among the Mahometists of a soveraigne devotion and puritie of maners; they hold, that the readiest and shortest way to gaine Paradise, is to kill some one of a contrary religion […].

2. Someone who intentionally kills a person, especially a professional who kills a public or political figure.
   • 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XXII, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 233:

     The hand that held the bond of so many jarring interests lay powerless beneath the pall. The perils of war had been about him, and the midnight assassin had watched his path; yet he died quietly in his bed.

   • 1968, Robert F. Kennedy, On the Mindless Menace of Violence:

     What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause can ever be stilled by an assassin’s bullet.

   • 2013 June 29, “Travels and travails”, in The Economist‎, volume 407, number 8842, page 55:

     Even without hovering drones, a lurking assassin, a thumping score and a denouement, the real-life story of Edward Snowden, a rogue spy on the run, could be straight out of the cinema. But, as with Hollywood, the subplots and exotic locations may distract from the real message: America’s discomfort and its foes’ glee.

3. Any ruthless killer.
4. (algebra, somewhat humorous) An associated prime of a module.

• See also Thesaurus:killer

assassin (third-person singular simple present assassins, present participle assassining, simple past and past participle assassined)

1. (nonstandard) To assassinate.

From either Arabic حَشَّاشِين (ḥaššāšīn, “hashish users”) or أَسَاسِيُّون (ʔasāsiyyūn).

• IPA^(key): /a.sa.sɛ̃/

• Audio

  (file)

assassin m (plural assassins, feminine assassine)

1. an assassin or other murderer

assassin (feminine assassine, masculine plural assassins, feminine plural assassines)

1. deadly; fatal; that kills

• “assassin”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.