(Ital. corsare, from corso, a course or career; Lat. cursus, from curro, to run;) a pirate, one who scours the seas in an armed vessel without commission from any prince or power, in order to plunder merchant ships. This name was particularly given to the piratical cruisers of Bar- bary under the two Barbarossas, about the beginning of the sixteenth century. See BARBAROSSA, and BECANEER.