Attested from around 1400 as Middle English canon, canoun, from Old French canon, from Italian cannone, from Latin canna, from Ancient Greek κάννα, from Akkadian 𒄀, from Sumerian 𒄀𒈾.

This spelling was not fixed until about 1800.

• enPR: kăn'ən, IPA: /ˈkæn.ən/

cannon

1. A complete assembly, consisting of an artillery tube and a breech mechanism, firing mechanism or base cap, which is a component of a gun, howitzer or mortar. It may include muzzle appendages.
2. Any similar device for shooting material out of a tube.

   water cannon, glitter cannon, confetti cannon, potato cannon

   1. (military, chiefly, aviation) An autocannon.
3. A bone of a horse's leg, between the fetlock joint and the knee or hock.
4. A cannon bit.
5. (historical) A large muzzle-loading artillery piece.
6. (sports, billiards, snooker, pool) A carom.

   In English billiards, a cannon is when one's cue ball strikes the other player's cue ball and the red ball on the same shot; and it is worth two points.

7. (baseball, figuratively, informal) The arm of a player who can throw well.

   He's got a cannon out in right.

8. (engineering) A hollow cylindrical piece carried by a revolving shaft, on which it may, however, revolve independently.
9. (historical) A cylindrical item of plate armor protecting the arm, particularly one of a pair of such cylinders worn with a couter, the upper cannon protecting the upper arm and the lower cannon protecting the forearm.

   Coordinate terms: rerebrace, vambrace

   • 1949, The Connoisseur:

     The pauldrons are rather weak, but the cannons of the vambraces are good and come from an Italian armour of considerably earlier date, for they have the tulip form of the first half of the century.

   • 1972, Claude Blair, European Armour: Circa 1066 to Circa 1700:

     During the second half of the century the upper cannons were often joined to the pauldrons […] Here the cannons and the couter, although separate, are joined together when worn by the points securing them to the arming […]

10. (printing, uncountable) Alternative form of canon
11. (Chinese chess) A piece which moves horizontally and vertically like a rook but captures another piece by jumping over a different piece in the line of attack.
12. (US, slang) A pickpocket.
    • 1977, Robert S. Weppner, Street ethnography, page 70:

      I also learned never to conspicuoulsy^[sic] watch a cannon while he was working. Pickpockets dislike being watched, even by those who may be "right," because they become uneasy and clumsy and feel conspicuous.

    • 2009, James Thomson, Bedlam City: Savage Worlds Edition, page 377:

      A good pickpocket is known to his fellows as a pistol. Rufus Dayne is a cannon. One of the best pickpockets in the country, he makes close to a million dollars a year and has no criminal record at all.

• French: canon
• German: Kanone
• Italian: cannone
• Portuguese: canhão
• Russian: пу́шка
• Spanish: cañón

• Italian: carambola
• Russian: карамбо́ль

cannon (cannons, present participle cannoning; simple past and past participle cannoned)

1. To bombard with cannons.
2. (sports, billiards, snooker, pool) To play the carom billiard shot; to strike two balls with the cue ball.

   The white cannoned off the red onto the pink.

3. To fire something, especially spherical, rapidly.
4. To collide or strike violently, especially so as to glance off or rebound.
   • 1898, Rudyard Kipling, “The Maltese Cat”, in The Day's Work‎:

     […] he heard the right-hand goal post crack as a pony cannoned into it—crack, splinter, and fall like a mast.

• Italian: cannonare (rare), cannoneggiare

cannon (plural cannons)

1. (fandom slang) Misspelling of canon

cannon (not comparable)

1. (fandom slang) Misspelling of canon

• (America) IPA: /ˈkænən/

1. Surname.