English

Noun

sea rover ‎(plural sea rovers)

1. (Britain, colloquial, archaic) A herring.
2. (literally) One who roams about the ocean much of the time.
3. A pirate, buccaneer or privateer; an ocean-going marauder.
   • 1843 April 18, New York Insurance Co. et al., "To Commander A.S. Mackenzie", Niles National Register vol. 64 , page 179, originally published in the New York American,

     The turning of your ship into a sea-rover would have made the entire ocean a scene of outrage, rapine, and murder.

   • 1858, Thomas Hart Benton, Thirty Years' View: Or, A History of the Working of the American Government, vol. 2, page 546:

     It was a ridiculous scheme, both as to the force which was to take the ship, and her employment as a buccaneer -- the state of the ocean and of navigation being such at that time as to leave a sea-rover, pursued as he would be by the fleets of all nations, without a sea to sail in, without a coast to land on, without a rock or corner to hide in.

Synonyms

• (ocean-going marauder): pirate, corsair, see also Wikisaurus:pirate