释义 |
‖ ronin|ˈrəʊnɪn| Also with capital initial. [Jap.] In feudal Japan, a lordless wandering samurai; an outlaw. Also transf. in recent use, a Japanese student who has failed and is permitted to retake a university (entrance) examination.
1871A. B. Mitford Tales of Old Japan I. 4 The word Rônin..is used to designate persons of gentle blood, entitled to bear arms, who have become separated from their feudal lords. Ibid. 18 Then the Rônins lost patience. 1876W. E. Griffis Mikado's Empire i. xxvii. 278 When too deeply in debt, or having committed a crime, they left their homes and the service of their masters, and roamed at large. Such men were called rōnins, or ‘wave⁓men’. 1899Kipling From Sea to Sea I. xxi. 415 And now let us go to the tomb of the Forty-Seven Ronins. 1947R. Benedict Chrysanthemum & Sword vii. 138 The huge invincible ronin (a lordless samurai who lives by his own wits), the hero Benkei. 1967D. & E. T. Riesman Conversations in Japan 17 Many had been ronin (the name given those who try again and again over a period of years to pass the exams), and finally when they made it were exhausted. 1970Observer (Colour Suppl.) 8 Feb. 32/2 High school students who fail the university exam and are waiting to try again are called ronin, a reference to the landless samurai of old Japan which clearly describes their unhappy displaced position in a chronically status-sensitive society. 1974Encycl. Brit. Micropædia VIII. 663/1 Ronin, in Japan, masterless samurai (warrior aristocrats) of the Kamakura (1192–1333) and Tokugawa (1603–1876) periods who were often vagrant and disruptive and sometimes actively rebellious. |