Liliputin-3791

Hatchet man Rodion Raskolnikov tried to bury the hatchet,
but failed miserably ... "
Fyodor Mikhaylovich Dostoyevsky

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Hatchet= axt
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hatchet man noun

Definition of hatchet man
1: one hired for murder, coercion, or attack
2a: a writer specializing in invective
b: a person hired to perform underhanded or unscrupulous tasks (as to ruin someone's reputation)
Examples of hatchet man in a Sentence
 She doesn't criticize her opponent's character directly. She has her hatchet men in the media do it for her.
 He was fired by his boss's hatchet man.
Recent Examples on the Web
Indeed, Garland has quietly emerged as Donald Trump’s unwitting hatchet man, doing almost everything in his power to protect the lawless former President’s legacy.
— Jeff Hauser, The New Republic, 8 June 2021
The right wing's favorite hatchet man was now creating a new news network.
— Paul Bedard, Washington Examiner, 1 Feb. 2021
These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'hatchet man.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

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First Known Use of hatchet man
1876, in the meaning defined at sense 1

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Burying the hatchet
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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This article is about the American English phrase. For other uses, see Bury the Hatchet (disambiguation).
Bury the hatchet is an American English idiom meaning "to make peace". The phrase is an allusion to the figurative or literal practice of putting away weapons at the cessation of hostilities among or by Native Americans in the Eastern United States.

It specifically concerns the formation of the Iroquois Confederacy[1] and in Iroquois custom in general. Weapons were to be buried or otherwise cached in time of peace. Europeans first became aware of such a ceremony in 1644:[2][3]

"A translation of Thwaites' monumental work Jesuit Relations, 1644, suggests the practice: "Proclaim that they wish to unite all the nations of the earth and to hurl the hatchet so far into the depths of the earth that it shall never again be seen in the future."

The practice existed long before European settlement of the Americas, though the phrase emerged in English by the 17th century.[1][3]