missile

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   A flying weapon that is powered and can be steered toward its target.

   The army fired a missile at the enemy base.

2. 2
   noun

   Any object thrown or shot through the air as a weapon, such as a stone or arrow.

   The crowd threw bottles and other missiles at the police.

Appears in

Simplified etymology

Missile comes from a form of Latin mittere, meaning “to send.” It first referred to gifts thrown to crowds by Roman emperors, then in the 1650s came to mean an object forcibly propelled at a target; its modern sense of a rocket or similar weapon is recorded from 1945.

From Latin missile (“thrown weapon, projectile”), neuter of missilis (“throwable, capable of being thrown”), from mittere (“to send”). From 1611. Compare Middle French missile (“projectile”), from 1636.

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External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary