Crossword clues for musket
musket
- Revolutionary War firearm
- Old arm
- Athos's arm
- A muzzle-loading shoulder gun with a long barrel
- Formerly used by infantrymen
- Rifle forerunner
- Early infantry firearm
- Old firearm
- Old banger, American truck finally impounded by police
- King, Eastern, accommodated in requirement for outdated gun
- Long-barrelled gun
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Musket \Mus"ket\, n. [F. mousquet, It. moschetto, formerly, a kind of hawk; cf. OF. mousket, moschet, a kind of hawk falcon, F. mouchet, prop., a little fly (the hawk prob. being named from its size), fr. L. musca a fly. Cf. Mosquito.]
(Zo["o]l.) The male of the sparrow hawk.
A species of firearm formerly carried by the infantry of an army. It was originally fired by means of a match, or matchlock, for which several mechanical appliances (including the flintlock, and finally the percussion lock) were successively substituted. This arm has been completely superseded by the rifle, and is now only of historical interest.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
"firearm for infantry" (later replaced by the rifle), 1580s, from Middle French mousquette, also the name of a kind of sparrow-hawk, diminutive of mosca "a fly," from Latin musca (see midge). The hawk so called either for its size or because it looks speckled when in flight. Early firearms often were given names of beasts (compare dragoon, also falcon, a kind of cannon mentioned by Hakluyt), and the equivalent word in Italian was used to mean "an arrow for a crossbow." The French word was borrowed earlier into English (early 15c.) in its literal sense of "sparrow-hawk."
Wiktionary
n. A species of firearm formerly carried by the infantry of an army. It was originally fired by means of a match, or matchlock, for which several mechanical appliances (including the flintlock, and finally the percussion lock) were successively substituted. This arm has been superseded by the rifle.
WordNet
n. a muzzle-loading shoulder gun with a long barrel; formerly used by infantrymen
Wikipedia
A musket is a muzzle-loaded, smoothbore firearm, fired from the shoulder. Muskets were designed for use by infantry. A soldier armed with a musket had the designation musketman or musketeer.
The musket replaced the arquebus, and was in turn replaced by the rifle (in both cases, after a long period of coexistence). The term "musket" is applied to a variety of weapons, including the long, heavy guns with matchlock, wheel lock or flint lock and loose powder fired with the gun barrel resting on a stand, and also lighter weapons with a snaphance, flintlock, or caplock and bullets using a stabilizing spin ( Minié ball), affixed with a bayonet.
The musket first made its appearance when a specialist class of troops armed with a heavy version of the arquebus called a musketin was introduced to support the arquebusiers and pikemen in the Spanish tercios. By the end of the 17th century, a lighter version of the musket had edged out the arquebus, and the addition of the bayonet edged out the pike, and almost all infantry became musketeers.
In the 18th century, improvements in ammunition and firing methods allowed rifling to be practical for military use, and the term "rifled gun" gave way to "rifle". In the 19th century, rifled muskets (which were technically rifles, but were referred to as muskets) became common, combining the advantages of rifles and muskets. About the time of the introduction of cartridge, breechloading, and multiple rounds of ammunition just a few years later, muskets fell out of fashion.
Musket calibers ranged from . A typical smooth bore musket firing at a single man-sized target was only accurate to about using the military ammunition of the day, which used a much smaller bullet than the musket bore to compensate for accumulation of ash in the barrel under battlefield conditions. Rifled muskets of the mid-19th century, like the Springfield Model 1861, were significantly more accurate, with the ability to hit a man sized target at a distance of or more. The advantage of this extended range was demonstrated at the Battle of Four Lakes, where Springfield Model 1855 rifled muskets inflicted heavy casualties among the Indian warriors before they could get their smooth bore muskets into range. However, in the Italian War of 1859, French forces were able to defeat the longer range of Austrian rifle muskets by aggressive skirmishing and rapid bayonet assaults during close quarters combat.
Musket (1867–1885) was an English-bred Thoroughbred racehorse and a Leading sire in Australia and New Zealand.
Usage examples of "musket".
Pangle stood beside him, and theirs was the proud and nervous pose men struck when having ambrotypes made at the start of the war, though instead of rifle musket and Colt pistol and bowie knife, Stobrod and Pangle held fiddle and banjo before them as defining implements.
Groping behind into the basket, the balloonist pulled out a musket and, before Hassan could even react to the sight, fired a load of shot that ripped Iman across the throat and chest.
Their mouths were dry from biting into the cartridges, their lips were flecked with unburned powder, and sweat had carved clean rivulets down their faces which were blackened by the smoke and smuts from the powder exploding in their musket pans.
Once a man even reached the Chesaux de Frise, he swept at the sabre blades with a musket, bellowing defiance, and then he was hit by an unseen French infantryman and he fell, twisting like a rag doll, down the slope and the French jeered him and poured fire down.
More frenchmen came from the village to bolster the attack, then a splintering deluge of rifle and musket fire flashed from the stony outc opsjust above the blood reased slope.
Suddenly a single musket shot thudded out in the darkness ahead and, without waiting for the order, the column reined in.
It will put such a panic into Messieurs the Sansculottes that within ten days Hoche will have received every musket and every sabre they can muster.
Sent shallop to head of harbor with mattocks and spades, as desired by those ashore, the seamen taking their muskets also.
He glanced sharply at Fergus, but then shouldered his musket and hurried after his companions.
The second men of the allied skirmishing pairs fired, but the voltigeurs were too numerous and their musket fire was almost continuous and the red, green and brown jackets were falling back.
Ahead of the column the sound of the skirmishing grew in intensity as the voltigeurs closed the range and opened on the riflemen with their muskets.
There was some skirmishing, small outbreaks of musket fire, the feeling out of two great armies close together.
He snatched the next loaded musket that one of his gun boys handed him, and cocked the hammer, then ducked under the swaying body of the wagon.
No man on board the Isis would dare aim a musket at Stoker for fear of hitting her.
I observed at Ternate that many of the men have muskets, and the sound of firearms would therefore in no way alarm them.