Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun One that seeks adventure.
  • noun A soldier of fortune.
  • noun A heavy speculator in stocks, business, or trade.
  • noun One that attempts to gain wealth and social position unscrupulously.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun One who engages in adventure; an undertaker of uncertain or hazardous actions or enterprises, as in travel, war, trade, speculation, etc.: as, the Young Adventurer, a title given to Prince Charles Edward Stuart on account of his leading the desperate insurrection of 1745.
  • noun In general, one who undertakes any great commercial risk or speculation; a speculator; in mining, a shareholder in or promoter of mines, particularly under the cost-book system. See cost-book.
  • noun In a bad sense, a seeker of fortune by underhand or equivocal means; a speculator upon the credulity or good nature of others; especially, one who ingratiates himself with society by false show or pretense in order to gain a surreptitious livelihood.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun One who adventures; ; one who seeks his fortune in new and hazardous or perilous enterprises.
  • noun A social pretender on the lookout for advancement.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun One who adventures; as, the merchant adventurers; one who seeks his fortune in new and hazardous or perilous enterprises.
  • noun A soldier of fortune, a speculator.
  • noun A social pretender on the lookout for advancement; one who pushes his fortune by equivocal means, as false pretences.
  • noun video games A player of adventure games or text adventures.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a person who enjoys taking risks
  • noun someone who travels into little known regions (especially for some scientific purpose)

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Compare French aventurier; adventure +‎ -er.

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Examples

  • The word adventurer has been through a half-millennium of exciting times.

    No Uncertain Terms William Safire 2003

  • The word adventurer has been through a half-millennium of exciting times.

    No Uncertain Terms William Safire 2003

  • The word adventurer has been through a half-millennium of exciting times.

    No Uncertain Terms William Safire 2003

  • The word adventurer has been through a half-millennium of exciting times.

    No Uncertain Terms William Safire 2003

  • Such are among the sad chances to which the life of the Rocky Mountain adventurer is exposed.

    Life in the Rocky Mountains 1844

  • Another book on the American adventurer is in the works: Ethan has a knack for staying in trouble.

    William Dietrich biography 2009

  • The basic difference between a tourist and an adventurer is that the former pays in advance to make sure his arrangement is safe and without any dramatic meanderings from their vacation plans.

    Global Voices in English » Macedonia, Bulgaria: Days of Mourning After the Lake Ohrid Shipwreck 2009

  • *As late as 1939, when Life magazine ran an article in which he was referred to as a lobbyist and an adventurer, Bunau-Varilla, at age eighty, responded that he had been no such thing: Unless you call adventurer a man who sacrifices his time, his money and his scientific capacities to the glory of his nation and to the service of her great friend the United States. . .

    The Path Between the Seas DAVID McCULLOUGH. 2005

  • *As late as 1939, when Life magazine ran an article in which he was referred to as a lobbyist and an adventurer, Bunau-Varilla, at age eighty, responded that he had been no such thing: Unless you call adventurer a man who sacrifices his time, his money and his scientific capacities to the glory of his nation and to the service of her great friend the United States. . .

    The Path Between the Seas DAVID McCULLOUGH. 2005

  • For does not the word adventurer stand for the pioneer, the explorer, the inventor, the soldier and the sailor?

    The Lure of the Mask Harold MacGrath 1901

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