\Car`bo*na"ro\, n.; pl. {Carbonari}. [It., a coal
man.]
A member of a secret political association in Italy,
organized in the early part of the nineteenth centry for the
purpose of changing the government into a republic.
Note: The origin of the Carbonari is uncertain, but the
      society is said to have first met, in 1808, among the
      charcoal burners of the mountains, whose phraseology
      they adopted.