[ noun ] the horseman who pricks the bull with a lance early in the bullfight to goad the bull and to make it keep its head low <noun.person>
Picador \Pic`a*dor"\, n. [Sp.] A horseman armed with a lance, who in a bullfight receives the first attack of the bull, and excites him by picking him without attempting to kill him.
A good fighting bull must be strong, and so fierce that it will charge straight at the picador's horse and stubbornly try to gore the matador's red cape.
"Very smooth," the count notes in his book, as the cow charges the picador's horse and buries its horns in its side despite the jabbing of the lance.