half-pike
AmericanEtymology
Origin of half-pike
First recorded in 1590–1600
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
It is usually fastened to the top of a half-pike, and placed on the weather side of the quarter-deck, in order to show the helmsman the direction of the wind.
From The Sailor's Word-Book An Alphabetical Digest of Nautical Terms, including Some More Especially Military and Scientific, but Useful to Seamen; as well as Archaisms of Early Voyagers, etc. by Belcher, Edward, Sir
"Or my men'll not be in the mood to so much as lift a half-pike."
From Caribbee by Hoover, Thomas
The raparees were so called from the rapary or half-pike they carried.
From The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D. — Volume 06 The Drapier's Letters by Swift, Jonathan
"They were called Rapparees," Mr. Malone says, "from being armed with a half-pike, called by the Irish a rapparee."
From Rookwood by Ainsworth, William Harrison
More than a dozen times they appeared as Achilles and Hector, with the old-fashioned, full-length, man-protecting shield, the short Argive sword and the heavy lance, half-pike, half-javelin, of Trojan tradition.
From Andivius Hedulio Adventures of a Roman Nobleman in the Days of the Empire by White, Edward Lucas
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
