Noun: traitor
| Singular | traitor |
| Plural | traitors |
Sample Sentences
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After World War I, the communists and Jews were accused to be traitors by the German right wing (the "stab-in-the-back myth"), ultimately culminating in their persecution and massacre.
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My Lord of Hereford here whom you call King, / Is a foule traitour to proud Herefords King, / And if you crowne him let me propheſie, / The bloud of Engliſh ſhall manure the ground, / And future ages groane for this foule act, [...] [1595 December 9 (first known performance), [William Shakespeare], The Tragedie of King Richard the Second. […] (First Quarto), London: […] Valentine Simmes for Androw Wise, […], published 1597, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene i]:]
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Yes, that was Vice President Spiro Agnew commemorating the "loyalty" of literal traitors. But what can you really expect from a man whose name rearranged spells "grow a penis." [2017 October 8, “Confederacy” (14:45 from the start), in Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, season 4, episode 26, John Oliver (actor), via HBO:]
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It's second nature now to think myself a traitor
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To myself, to all I've ever burdened with my rotting visage
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I can't breathe, the weight of all I've disappointed crushes me
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If I were happy, it would feel as if I couldn't trust me [2019, Patricia Taxxon, “Cold Water”, in Doraemon:]
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It took you two weeks
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To go off and date her
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Guess you didn't cheat
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But you're still, you're still a traitor
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Yeah, you're still a traitor [2021, Olivia Rodrigo, Dan Nigro, “Traitor”, in Sour, performed by Olivia Rodrigo:]
Nouns inflected like traitor
soldier's woundwort,
Nicosian,
whopper,
greypate,
tactile sign language,
chronotrope,
Rosie Lee,
dissentient,
photoinactivator,
sulphonediimine,
coastal waterfall,
residuary devise,
bituminization,
nitrosonaphthol,
smṛiti,
geosphere,
backscreen,
mensuralist,
flocculate,
flocculant, etc. (List truncated at 20 nouns)
Etymology
From Middle English traitor, traitour, traytour, from Old French traïtor (French traître), from Latin trāditor. Displaced native Middle English swike from Old English swica (“traitor”), and Middle English proditour and traditour borrowed directly from Latin. The general Old English word denoting "traitor" was lǣwa or lǣwend. Doublet of traditor and treason. See: French Nouns '
traître', Latin Nouns '
trāditor'.