galley slave

1. 1.

   a slave condemned to row in a galley

   Broaderslave
2. 2.

   a laborer who is obliged to do menial work

   Synonymsdrudgepeonnavvy

   Broaderlaborer

Questions about galley slave

What does galley slave mean?

galley slave means "a slave condemned to row in a galley". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

What is another word for galley slave?

Close synonyms include drudge, peon, navvy. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is galley slave a common word?

galley slave is banded "Uncommon" — turns up in careful writing rather than conversation. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.