First recorded in 1865–70
First recorded in 1880–85
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Both Madis vehicles are equipped with a cannon and a smaller machine gun that, along with new types of ammunition, are becoming a growing part of antidrone operations.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 30, 2026
The Taiwanese boats also have water cannon and a 20-millimetre static machine gun, but are careful to avoid a confrontation that "could lead to unimaginable consequences", Huang said.
From Barron's • Nov. 11, 2025
On a shelf is a photograph of Wanda as a fighter, brandishing a machine gun during the Warsaw Uprising of 1944, when the Polish underground fought the German Army amidst the ruins of the city.
From BBC • May 2, 2025
Bump stocks are replacement shoulder stocks that allow a semiautomatic gun to fire at nearly the rate of a machine gun.
From Salon • Jul. 18, 2024
Somewhere nearby an incongruous sound shook the dark, an air hammer pounding like a machine gun.
From "Invisible Man" by Ralph Ellison
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.
