battleship

[bat-l-ship]

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR battleship ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

any of a class of warships that are the most heavily armored and are equipped with the most powerful armament.

ship of the line.

Origin of battleship

An Americanism dating back to 1785–95; battle¹ + ship¹

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for battleship

battlewagon

Examples from the Web for battleship

Contemporary Examples of battleship

Using skewers/tooth picks, attach monkey bread, Cinnabons, and churros to battleship.
Epic Meal Empire’s Meat Monstrosities: From the Bacon Spider to the Cinnabattleship
Harley Morenstein
July 26, 2014
Sober and muted colors including shades of gray, one described in a local paper as ‘Battleship,’ were prevalent.
How World Wars Made Females More Androgynous
Liza Foreman
July 22, 2014
The leading-man roles followed in the back-to-back 2012 blockbusters John Carter and Battleship.
‘Lone Survivor’ Taylor Kitsch’s Journey From Homelessness to Hollywood Stardom
Marlow Stern
December 18, 2013
Additional film credits include The Rundown, The Kingdom, Hancock, Battleship, and the upcoming Cocaine Cowboys.
The Hero Summit 2013 Speakers
September 10, 2013
As a member of the Royal Navy, he was in charge of operating the searchlights on a battleship called the Valiant.
A Very Unhappy 92nd Birthday for Prince Philip as He Recovers From Surgery in Hospital
Tom Sykes
June 10, 2013

Historical Examples of battleship

It was so huge and vast that even the crew of the battleship burst into a cheer.
The Cruise of the Dry Dock
T. S. Stribling
It was the solemn note of a battleship destroyed by its own magazines.
The Cruise of the Dry Dock
T. S. Stribling
A battleship should be at least twice as long as a torpedo-boat destroyer.
Boys' Book of Model Boats
Raymond Francis Yates
A view of the battleship as it will look in the water is shown in Fig. 31.
Boys' Book of Model Boats
Raymond Francis Yates
France had accepted the verdict; but now a second battleship was gone.
The Destroyer
Burton Egbert Stevenson

British Dictionary definitions for battleship

battleship

noun

a heavily armoured warship of the largest type having many large-calibre guns

(formerly) a warship of sufficient size and armament to take her place in the line of battle; ship of the line

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for battleship

1794, shortened from line-of-battle ship (1705), one large enough to take part in a main attack (formerly one of 74-plus guns); from battle (n.) + ship (n.). Later in U.S. Navy in reference to a class of ships that carried guns of the largest size. The last was decommissioned in 2006. Battleship-gray as a color is attested from 1916. Fighter and bomber airplanes in World War I newspaper articles were sometimes called battleplanes, but it did not catch on.