spear
UK /spɪə̯(ɹ)/ · US /spɪɹ/ noun, verb, adjective, proper noun
Also a form of speer
Forms spears spearing speared
- noun A long stick with a sharp tip used as a weapon for throwing or thrusting, or anything used to make a thrusting motion.
- noun (now chiefly historical) A soldier armed with such a weapon; a spearman.
- noun A lance with barbed prongs, used by fishermen to retrieve fish.
- noun (ice hockey) An illegal maneuver using the end of a hockey stick to strike into another hockey player.
- noun (wrestling) In professional wrestling, a running tackle in which the wrestler's shoulder is driven into the opponent's midsection.
- noun A shoot, as of grass; a spire.
- noun The feather of a horse.
- noun The rod to which the bucket, or plunger, of a pump is attached; a pump rod.
- verb (transitive) To pierce with a spear.
- verb (transitive, by extension) To penetrate or strike with, or as if with, any long narrow object; to make a thrusting motion that catches an object on the tip of a long device.
- verb (gridiron football) To tackle an opponent by ramming into them with one's helmet.
- verb (intransitive) To shoot into a long stem, as some plants do.
- verb (transitive, obsolete, especially in Regency England) To ignore as a social snub.
- adjective Male.
- adjective Pertaining to male family members.
- noun (botany) The sprout of a plant, stalk
- noun (obsolete) A church spire.
- proper noun An English surname transferred from the nickname or originating as an occupation.
Synonyms
Antonyms
Etymology
From Middle English spere, sperre, spear, from Old English spere, from Proto-West Germanic *speru, from Proto-Germanic *speru, from Proto-Indo-European *sperH-.
See also West Frisian spear, Dutch speer, German Speer, Old Norse spjǫr, *sparrô, Middle Dutch sparre (“rafter”), Old Norse sparri (“spar, rafter”), sperra (“rafter, beam”); also Latin sparus (“short spear”), Albanian ferrë (“thorn, thornbush”).
Alteration of spire, from Middle English spyre, spier, spir, from Old English spīr (“stalk of a plant, shoot, blade”). More at spire.
From Middle English spere (“spear”), from Old English spere (“spear”), variously intending a spearman, a spearmaker, or a person tall and thin in a way reminiscent of a spear.
Webster’s 1913
- noun A long, pointed weapon, used in war and hunting, by thrusting or throwing; a weapon with a long shaft and a sharp head or blade; a lance.
- noun Fig.: A spearman. Sir W. Scott.
- verb To pierce with a spear; to kill with a spear; as, to spear a fish.
- verb To shoot into a long stem, as some plants. See Spire. Mortimer.
Etymology [OE. spere, AS. spere; akin to D. & G. speer, OS. & OHS. sper, Icel. spjör, pl., Dan. spær, L. sparus.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “spear”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details