small arm

small arm

English

Noun

small arm (plural small arms)

1. A firearm designed to be carried and fired by a single person, and often held in the hand.
   • 1685, Basil Ringrose, Bucaniers of America, London: William Crooke, Volume 2, Part 4, Chapter 3, p. 10,

     […] about break of day, we heard from the Town a small Arm discharged, and after that a Drum beating a travailler.

   • 1724, Daniel Defoe, A General History of the Pyrates, London: T. Warner, Chapter 17, p. 398,

     If any Man shall offer to run away, or keep any Secret from the Company, he shall be marroon’d, with one Bottle of Powder, one Bottle of Water, one small Arm, and Shot.

   • 1880, George Manville Fenn, Jack at Sea, London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, Chapter 6, p. 77,

     “Men are all well drilled, sir,” continued the captain, “and have regular small-arm practice […] ”

   • 1904, Joseph Conrad, Nostromo, New York and London: Harper, Part 3, Chapter 10, p. 541,

     […] the first of Barrios’s transports, one of our own ships at that, steamed right in, and, ranging close alongside, opened a small-arm fire without as much preliminaries as a hail.

Usage notes

In the singular, mainly used attributively (e.g. small-arm ammunition).

Translations

firearm to be carried and fired by a single person — see small arms