/spɪə̯(ɹ)/, /spɪɹ/
OriginFrom Middle English spere, sperre, spear, from Old English spere, from Proto-West Germanic *speru, from Proto-Germanic *speru, from Proto-Indo-European *sperH-.
Cognates
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”).
- A long stick with a sharp tip used as a weapon for throwing or thrusting, or anything used to make a thrusting motion.
“It's not like you killed someone
It's not like you drove a spiteful spear into his side
Talk to Jesus Christ as if he knows the reasons why
He did it all for you”
- historicalA soldier armed with such a weapon; a spearman.
“Now toil'd the Bruce, the battle done ,
To use his conquest boldly won;
And gave command for horse and spear
To press the Southron's scatter'd rear”
“Two of the four spears came directly from Lady Margaret's staff. One was her great-nephew Maurice St John […].”
- A lance with barbed prongs, used by fishermen to retrieve fish.
- An illegal maneuver using the end of a hockey stick to strike into another hockey player.
- In professional wrestling, a running tackle in which the wrestler's shoulder is driven into the opponent's midsection.
- A shoot, as of grass; a spire.
- The feather of a horse.
- The rod to which the bucket, or plunger, of a pump is attached; a pump rod.
- A long, thin strip from a vegetable.
“asparagus and broccoli spears”
- The sprout of a plant, stalk
- obsoleteA church spire.
- transitiveTo pierce with a spear.
“By the 1970s, herders were spearing rhinos and poisoning lions to protest the loss of their land to conservation, then represented by the independent Kenyan government.”
- broadly, transitiveTo 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.
“Former teammate Derek Sanderson recalls that Maki hit Ted from behind as Green was clearing the puck from the Boston zone. Green turned to knock Maki down, but Maki speared him as he rose from the ice”
- To tackle an opponent by ramming into them with one's helmet.
- intransitiveTo shoot into a long stem, as some plants do.
“you may prepare them for spearing by laying the Keys in Earth or Sand”
- especially, obsolete, transitiveTo ignore as a social snub.
“The Monthly Magazine, Or, British Register for 1798 included an explanation by a reader of how the cut was carried out in his college days in a lengthy letter to the editor, signed by the pseudonym "A”
- not-comparableMale.
“a spear counterpart”
“When I was young, I was so desperate I'd go looking on the spear side.”
- not-comparablePertaining to male family members.
“the spear side of the family”
Formsspears(plural) · spears(present, singular, third-person) · spearing(participle, present) · speared(participle, past) · speared(past) · Spears(plural)