Originally short for “rifled gun”, referring to the spiral grooves inside the barrel. From Middle English riflen, from Old French rifler, from Old High German riffilōn (compare German riffeln, archaic Dutch rijfelen, Old English rifelan, riflian), frequentative of Proto-Germanic *rīfaną (compare Old Norse rífa).

• IPA: /ˈɹaɪfəl/

rifle (plural rifles)

1. (weaponry) A firearm fired from the shoulder; improved range and accuracy is provided by a long, rifled barrel.
   • 1907 January, Harold Bindloss, chapter 7, in The Dust of Conflict, 1st Canadian edition, Toronto, Ont.: McLeod & Allen, →OCLC ↗:

     Still, a dozen men with rifles, and cartridges to match, stayed behind when they filed through a white aldea lying silent amid the cane, and the Sin Verguenza swung into slightly quicker stride.

2. (military, usually, in the plural, dated) A rifleman.
3. (weaponry) An artillery piece with a rifled barrel.
4. A strip of wood covered with emery or a similar material, used for sharpening scythes.

• French: fusil
• German: Gewehr
• Italian: fucile
• Portuguese: fuzil, espingarda, rifle, refle
• Russian: ружьё
• Spanish: fusil, rifle

rifle (rifles, present participle rifling; simple past and past participle rifled)

1. (intransitive) To quickly search through many items (such as papers, the contents of a drawer, a pile of clothing). (See also riffle)

   She made a mess when she rifled through the stack of papers, looking for the title document.

2. (intransitive) To commit robbery or theft.
3. (transitive) To search with intent to steal; to ransack, pillage or plunder.
   • 1633, Joseph Hall, A paraphrase upon the hard texts of Scripture:

     thine enemies […] shall ransack and rifle all the things of Edom; and shall search out all thy hidden commodities, and carry them away at once

4. (transitive) To strip of goods; to rob; to pillage.
   • c. 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Winters Tale”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act IV, scene v]:

     Stand, sir, and throw us that you have about ye: / If not, we'll make you sit and rifle you.

   • 1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London, Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC ↗:

     Ben, in his long, lonely wanderings about the island, had found the skeleton — it was he that had rifled it; he had found the treasure; he had dug it up […]

5. (transitive) To seize and bear away by force; to snatch away; to carry off.
   • 1715–1720, Homer, translated by Alexander Pope, “Book I”, in The Iliad of Homer, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: […] W[illiam] Bowyer, for Bernard Lintott […], →OCLC ↗:

     Time shall rifle every youthful grace.

6. (transitive) To add a spiral groove to a gun bore to make a fired bullet spin in flight in order to improve range and accuracy.
7. (transitive) To cause (a projectile, as a rifle bullet) to travel in a flat ballistic trajectory.
   • 2011 Fighting for Gold: The Story of Canada's Sledge Hockey Paralympic Gold by Lorna Schultz Schultz Nicholson

     But a Norwegian player rifled off a point shot that sailed into the back of the net.

8. (intransitive) To move in a flat ballistic trajectory (as a rifle bullet).
   • 2014, Alexander Rebelle, Lights of Summer: The Run for Glory:

     The ball rifled off the bat.

9. (transitive, obsolete) To dispose of in a raffle.
   • c. 1600 (date written; first published 1657), attributed to Thomas Dekker, John Day, William Houghton, Lust's Dominion: Or, The Lascivious Queen. A Tragedie, London: […] J. Chappell, Jun. […], published 1818, →OCLC ↗, Act V, scene i, page 68 ↗:

     I've at one throw / Rifled away the diadem of Spain; […]

   • 1605, John Webster, Northward Ho:

     If you like not that course but intend to be rid of her , rifle her at a tavern , where you may swallow down some fifty wiseacres ' sons and heirs to old tenements and common gardens , like so many raw yolks with muscadine to bedward Kate.

10. (intransitive, obsolete) To engage in a raffle.

• Portuguese: revirar