musket
Americannoun
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muskets
plural
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a heavy, large-caliber smoothbore gun for infantry soldiers, introduced in the 16th century: the predecessor of the modern rifle.
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the male sparrow hawk, Accipiter nisus.
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of musket
1580–90; < Middle French mousquet < Italian moschetto crossbow arrow, later musket, originally kind of hawk, equivalent to mosch ( a ) fly (< Latin musca ) + -etto -et
Explanation
A musket is a long, front-loaded, over-the-shoulder gun. Muskets have been used in many wars, such as the American Civil War. There are many types of guns. One that's gone out of style is the musket. This weapon of choice for infantrymen was distinctive in a few ways. It was fired over your shoulder (or sometimes mounted on a stand), and it had a very long barrel. It was also muzzle-loaded, which means it was loaded through the front of the gun, not the back, like most contemporary guns.
Vocabulary lists containing musket
Star-Spangled Vocabulary: Patriotic Words
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The American Civil War
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The American Revolution - Introductory
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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.
See Examples For:
A gun's rear sight and a musket side plate found nearby offer some support for that interpretation.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 22, 2026
French captures that sense of urgency in his figure who strides forward, musket in hand, roused to action by something perceived in the distance.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 2, 2026
Among the dozens and dozens of weapons hanging on the wall for sale are double barrel black powder shotguns – akin to a musket – and a few "they-don't-make-these-anymore" Winchester rifles from the 1800s.
From BBC ● Dec. 23, 2024
I would not have walked into a coffee shop with an AR-15 and expected the reactions I got for walking in with a musket, for one thing.
From Slate ● May 8, 2024
Those who saw him said that he fired his musket even as an arrow went right through his beard.
From "Blood on the River" by Elisa Carbone
That logic propagated from muskets to sewing machines and farm equipment, eroding craft economics and laying the groundwork for the modern assembly line.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 24, 2026
A musket ball is a type of ammunition used in muskets, which are long-barrelled, muzzle-loaded firearms that were commonly used from the 16th to the 19th centuries.
From BBC ● Jul. 23, 2024
With muskets drawn, Napoleon asks the chambers, “Shall we vote?”
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 10, 2024
FREDERICKSBURG, Va. — The “crossroads of the Civil War,” as Virginia’s Spotsylvania County calls itself, is once again a cauldron of hostilities, this time minus the muskets.
From Washington Times ● Nov. 5, 2023
And, boy, was it hard to get the muskets to fire right!
From I Survived the American Revolution, 1776 by Lauren Tarshis
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.
