carbine
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English
Alternative forms
Etymology
Ca. 1600, from French carabine. Doublet of carabine.
Pronunciation
- (General American) IPA(key): /ˈkɑɹ.bin/, /ˈkɑɹ.baɪn/
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /ˈkɑː.bin/, /ˈkɑː.baɪn/
Audio (Southern England) (file) Audio (Southern England) (file) - Homophone: carbene (one pronunciation)
Noun
carbine (plural carbines)
- A rifle with a short barrel.
- 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter IX, in Francesca Carrara. , volume III, London: Richard Bentley, , (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 69:
- "Caught at last, and by those rascally Roundheads, whom you call patriots and saints, in a few minutes more I shall be shot—that is, if their clumsy carbines take good aim—to be sure they can fire near enough their mark not to miss...
- 1934, George Orwell, chapter 6, in Burmese Days:
- The lock-up was upstairs, a cage surrounded by six-inch wooden bars, guarded by a constable armed with a carbine.
- December 2010, John Pollock, A Foreign Devil in China, World Wide Publications, →ISBN, page 45:
- Inside the wall they found "a small cannon aimed at the entrance of the gate, and all along the street soldiers were stationed and a few on horseback were riding up and down. One of these had his carbine strapped on his back, and swung under his arm was a three-foot beheading sword wrapped in red cloth. That section had been terrorized by robbers, and they were prepared."
- 2017, Sam Shepard, chapter 27, in Spy of the First Person, →ISBN, page 60:
- The man who fired the carbine, who fired the gun with the scope, who brought the lead horse down, was discovered sitting cross-legged in a cargo van.
Derived terms
Translations
weapon similar to a rifle but much shorter in length
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