missile

English

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missile

Wikipedia

Etymology

From Latin missile (“thrown weapon, projectile”), neuter of missilis (“throwable, capable of being thrown”), from mittere (“to send”). From 1611. Compare Middle French missile (“projectile”), from 1636.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: mĭsʹīl, IPA^(key): /ˈmɪsaɪl/
• (General American, Canada) enPR: mĭsʹīl, mĭsʹəl, IPA^(key): /ˈmɪs(ə)l/, /-aɪl/

• Audio (GA)

  (file)

  (file)

• Homophone: missal (GA, Canada)
• Rhymes: -ɪsaɪl, -ɪsəl
• Hyphenation: mis‧sile

Noun

missile (plural missiles)

1. Any object used as a weapon by being thrown or fired through the air, such as stone, arrow or bullet.

   The Rhodians, who used leaden bullets, were able to project their missiles twice as far as the Persian slingers, who used large stones.

   • 1865, Walt Whitman, “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d”, in Sequel to Drum-Taps: When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d and other poems:

     And I saw askant the armies, / I saw as in noiseless dreams hundreds of battle-flags, / Borne through the smoke of the battles and pierc’d with missiles I saw them, / And carried hither and yon through the smoke, and torn and bloody, / And at last but a few shreds left on the staffs, (and all in silence,) / And the staffs all splinter’d and broken.

   • 2012, Paragraph 24, R v Blackshaw (2012) WLR 1126:

     Riot officers and police on horseback were deployed to disperse the crowns, but they came under attack from bottles, fireworks and other missiles.

2. (military) A self-propelled projectile whose trajectory can be adjusted after it is launched.

   That missile is explosive enough to kill hundreds.

Derived terms

Related terms

• mess
• message
• messenger
• mission
• missionary
• missive

Translations

See also

• projectile
• rocket

Further reading

• “missile”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “missile”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• James A. H. Murray [et al.], editors (1884–1928), “Missile”, in A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (Oxford English Dictionary), volumes VI, Part 2 (M–N), London: Clarendon Press, →OCLC, page 540, column 3.

Anagrams

• mislies, similes, slimies, smilies

French

Etymology

Inherited from Middle French, from Latin missilis (“that may be thrown”) (as in English).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /mi.sil/

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

missile m (plural missiles)

1. missile

Derived terms

• missile à tête chercheuse

Further reading

• “missile”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé , 2012.

Italian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈmis.si.le/
• Rhymes: -issile
• Hyphenation: mìs‧si‧le

Noun

missile m (plural missili)

1. missile

Adjective

missile (plural missili)

1. (relational) missile

Latin

Etymology

From missilis.

Noun

missile n (genitive missilis); third declension

1. a thrown weapon, such as a javelin
2. (plural) presents from the Emperor thrown to the people
3. (New Latin) a missile (self-propelled projectile)
   • 2018, Tuomo Pekkanen, Foederatio occidentalis Syriam missilibus percussit , Nuntii Latini 20.4.2018:

     USA, Britannia, Francia mane Sabbati plus centum missilia in tres metas Syriacas miserunt, in quibus arma chemica conficiebantur et tractabantur.

     The US, UK, and France Saturday morning fired over a hundred missiles at three Syrian sites in which chemical weapons were being built and stored.

Declension

Third-declension noun (neuter, “pure” i-stem).

Synonyms

• (javelin): tēlum, iaculum

Adjective

missile

1. nominative/accusative/vocative neuter singular of missilis

References

• “missilis”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “missilis”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• missile in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.