blunderbuss
Pronunciation Noun
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Pronunciation Noun
blunderbuss (plural blunderbusses)
- An old style of muzzleloading firearm and early form of shotgun with a distinctive short, large caliber barrel that is flared at the muzzle, therefore able to fire scattered quantities of nails, stones, shot, etc. at short range.
- 1817, Merriweather Lewis & William Clark, Travels to the Source of the Missouri River, and Across the American Continent to the Pacific Ocean, Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown (1817), page 354 ↗:
- We fired the blunderbuss several times by way of salute, and soon after landed at the bank near the village of the Mahahas, or Shoe Indians, and were received by a crowd of people, who came to welcome our return.
- 1942, Carl G. Erich, "Flintlock Blunderbuss ↗", Popular Science, June 1942:
- One of the most picturesque of the old flintlock guns is the blunderbuss, which was often carried by coach guards for protection against highwaymen.
- 2007, Norm Flayderman, Flayderman's Guide to Antique American Firearms, Gun Digest Books (2007), ISBN 9781440226519, page 764 ↗:
- The blunderbuss never gained great favor in the American colonies or early United States.
- 1817, Merriweather Lewis & William Clark, Travels to the Source of the Missouri River, and Across the American Continent to the Pacific Ocean, Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown (1817), page 354 ↗:
- French: tromblon, espingole
- German: Espingole
- Italian: spingarda
- Portuguese: bacamarte
- Russian: мушкето́н
- Spanish: trabuco
blunderbuss (blunderbusses, present participle blunderbussing; past and past participle blunderbussed)
- (transitive) To shoot with a blunderbuss.
This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.002