GUN

gun

(noun) the discharge of a firearm as signal or as a salute in military ceremonies; “two runners started before the gun”; “a twenty gun salute”

accelerator, accelerator pedal, gas pedal, gas, throttle, gun

(noun) a pedal that controls the throttle valve; “he stepped on the gas”

artillery, heavy weapon, gun, ordnance

(noun) large but transportable armament

gun

(noun) a weapon that discharges a missile at high velocity (especially from a metal tube or barrel)

gunman, gunslinger, hired gun, gun, gun for hire, triggerman, hit man, hitman, torpedo, shooter

(noun) a professional killer who uses a gun

gunman, gun

(noun) a person who shoots a gun (as regards their ability)

gun

(verb) shoot with a gun

Source: WordNet® 3.1


Etymology 1

Noun

gun (plural guns)

A device for projecting a hard object very forcefully; a firearm or cannon.

A very portable, short firearm, for hand use, which fires bullets or projectiles, such as a handgun, revolver, pistol, or Derringer.

A less portable, long firearm, bullet or projectile firing; a rifle, either manual, automatic or semi-automatic; a flintlock, musket or shotgun.

(military) A cannon with relatively long barrel, operating with relatively low angle of fire, and having a high muzzle velocity.

(military) A cannon with a 6-inch/155mm minimum nominal bore diameter and tube length 30 calibers or more. See also: howitzer; mortar.

(figurative) A firearm or cannon used for saluting or signalling.Wp

A device operated by a trigger and acting in a manner similar to a firearm.

Any implement designed to fire a projectile from a tube.

A device or tool that projects a substance.

A device or tool that applies something rather than projecting it.

(surfing) A long surfboard designed for surfing big waves (not the same as a longboard, a gun has a pointed nose and is generally a little narrower).

(cellular automata) A pattern that "fires" out other patterns.

(colloquial, metonym) A person who carries or uses a rifle, shotgun or handgun.

(colloquial, usually, in the plural) The biceps.

(nautical, in the plural) Violent blasts of wind.

(colloquial, ) An expert.

Verb

gun (third-person singular simple present guns, present participle gunning, simple past and past participle gunned)

(with “down”) To shoot someone or something, usually with a firearm.

To speed something up.

To offer vigorous support to a person or cause.

To seek to attack someone; to take aim at someone.

To practice fowling or hunting small game; chiefly in participial form: to go gunning.

(ambitransitive, prison slang) To masturbate while observing and visible to a corrections officer.

Etymology 2

Verb

gun

Nonstandard spelling of going to.

Anagrams

• GNU, Ngu, Ung, gnu, nug

Source: Wiktionary


Gun, n. Etym: [OE. gonne, gunne; of uncertain origin; cf. Ir., Gael.) A LL. gunna, W. gum; possibly (like cannon) fr. L. canna reed, tube; or abbreviated fr. OF. mangonnel, E. mangonel, a machine for hurling stones.]

1. A weapon which throws or propels a missile to a distance; any firearm or instrument for throwing projectiles by the explosion of gunpowder, consisting of a tube or barrel closed at one end, in which the projectile is placed, with an explosive charge behind, which is ignited by various means. Muskets, rifles, carbines, and fowling pieces are smaller guns, for hand use, and are called small arms. Larger guns are called cannon, ordnance, fieldpieces, carronades, howitzers, etc. See these terms in the Vocabulary. As swift as a pellet out of a gunne When fire is in the powder runne. Chaucer. The word gun was in use in England for an engine to cast a thing from a man long before there was any gunpowder found out. Selden.

2. (Mil.)

Definition: A piece of heavy ordnance; in a restricted sense, a cannon.

3. pl. (Naut.)

Definition: Violent blasts of wind.

Note: Guns are classified, according to their construction or manner of loading as rifled or smoothbore, breech-loading or muzzle-loading, cast or built-up guns; or according to their use, as field, mountain, prairie, seacoast, and siege guns. Armstrong gun, a wrought iron breech-loading cannon named after its English inventor, Sir William Armstrong.

– Great gun, a piece of heavy ordnance; hence (Fig.), a person superior in any way.

– Gun barrel, the barrel or tube of a gun.

– Gun carriage, the carriage on which a gun is mounted or moved.

– Gun cotton (Chem.), a general name for a series of explosive nitric ethers of cellulose, obtained by steeping cotton in nitric and sulphuric acids. Although there are formed substances containing nitric acid radicals, yet the results exactly resemble ordinary cotton in appearance. It burns without ash, with explosion if confined, but quietly and harmlessly if free and open, and in small quantity. Specifically, the lower nitrates of cellulose which are insoluble in ether and alcohol in distinction from the highest (pyroxylin) which is soluble. See Pyroxylin, and cf. Xyloidin. The gun cottons are used for blasting and somewhat in gunnery: for making celluloid when compounded with camphor; and the soluble variety (pyroxylin) for making collodion. See Celluloid, and Collodion. Gun cotton is frequenty but improperly called nitrocellulose. It is not a nitro compound, but an ethereal salt of nitric acid.

– Gun deck. See under Deck.

– Gun fire, the time at which the morning or the evening gun is fired.

– Gun metal, a bronze, ordinarily composed of nine parts of copper and one of tin, used for cannon, etc. The name is also given to certain strong mixtures of cast iron.

– Gun port (Naut.), an opening in a ship through which a cannon's muzzle is run out for firing.

– Gun tackle (Naut.), the blocks and pulleys affixed to the side of a ship, by which a gun carriage is run to and from the gun port.

– Gun tackle purchase (Naut.), a tackle composed of two single blocks and a fall. Totten.

– Krupp gun, a wrought steel breech-loading cannon, named after its German inventor, Herr Krupp.

– Machine gun, a breech-loading gun or a group of such guns, mounted on a carriage or other holder, and having a reservoir containing cartridges which are loaded into the gun or guns and fired in rapid succession, sometimes in volleys, by machinery operated by turning a crank. Several hundred shots can be fired in a minute with accurate aim. The Gatling gun, Gardner gun, Hotchkiss gun, and Nordenfelt gun, named for their inventors, and the French mitrailleuse, are machine guns.

– To blow great guns (Naut.), to blow a gale. See Gun, n., 3.

Gun, v. i.

Definition: To practice fowling or hunting small game; -- chiefly in participial form; as, to go gunning.

Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition



RESET




Word of the Day

20 April 2024

MULTIPHASE

(adjective) of an electrical system that uses or generates two or more alternating voltages of the same frequency but differing in phase angle


coffee icon

Coffee Trivia

There are more than 50 countries that export coffee. They are near the equator, where the climate is conducive to producing coffee beans.

coffee icon