flotilla
/floʊˈtɪlə/ noun
Forms flotillas
- noun (nautical) A small fleet of warships (usually of the same class), or a fleet of small ships.
- noun (by extension) A small group of things or people
- noun (cellular automata) A spaceship made of one or more central mutually stabilizing overweight spaceships flanked by lightweight, middleweight, or heavyweight spaceships that prevent the formation of destructive eggs.
Etymology
From Spanish flotilla, diminutive of flota (“fleet”), from French flotte.
Webster’s 1913
Etymology [Sp. flotilla, dim. of flota fleet; akin to F. flotte, It. flotta, and F. flot wave, fr. L. fluctus, but prob. influenced by words akin to E. float. See Fluctuate, and cf. Float, n.]
Sources: Wiktionary · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “flotilla”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details