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shoot

Contents

EnglishEdit

PronunciationEdit

Etymology 1Edit

From Middle English shoten, from Old English scēotan, from Proto-Germanic *skeutaną, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kéwd-e-ti, from *(s)kewd- (“to shoot, throw”). Cognate with West Frisian sjitte, Low German scheten, Dutch schieten, German schießen, Danish skyde, Norwegian Bokmål skyte, Norwegian Nynorsk skyta, Swedish skjuta; and also, through Indo-European, with Russian кида́ть (kidátʹ), Albanian hedh (“to throw, toss”), Persian چست‎‎ (čost, “quick, active”), Lithuanian skudrùs.

VerbEdit

shoot (third-person singular simple present shoots, present participle shooting, simple past shot, past participle shot or (rare) shotten)

  1. To launch a projectile.
    1. (transitive) To fire (a weapon that releases a projectile).
      to shoot a gun
    2. (transitive) To fire (a projectile).
    3. (transitive) To fire a projectile at (a person or target).
      The man, in a desperate bid for freedom, grabbed his gun and started shooting anyone he could.
      The hunter shot the deer to harvest its meat.
    4. (intransitive) To cause a weapon to discharge a projectile.
      They shot at a target.
      He shoots better than he rides.
    5. (transitive, slang) To ejaculate.
      After a very short time, he shot his load over the carpet.
    6. (intransitive, usually, as imperative) To begin to speak.
      "Can I ask you a question?"   "Shoot."
    7. (intransitive) To discharge a missile; said of a weapon.
      The gun shoots well.
    8. (transitive, figuratively) To dismiss or do away with.
      His idea was shot on sight.
    9. (transitive, intransitive, analogous) To photograph.
      He shot the couple in a variety of poses.
      He shot seventeen stills.
      • 2006, Michael Grecco, Lighting and the Dramatic Portrait, Amphoto Books, →ISBN, page 68:
        I had the pleasure of shooting Arnold Newman while teaching across the hall from him at a summer photo workshop.
    10. (transitive, intransitive, analogous, film, television) To film.
      The film was mostly shot in France.
  2. To move or act quickly or suddenly.
    1. (intransitive) To move very quickly and suddenly.
      After an initial lag, the experimental group's scores shot past the control group's scores in the fourth week.
      • (Can we date this quote?) John Dryden
        There shot a streaming lamp along the sky.
      • 1884: Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Chapter VII
        It didn't take me long to get there. I shot past the head at a ripping rate, the current was so swift, and then I got into the dead water and landed on the side towards the Illinois shore.
      • 1898, Winston Churchill, chapter 8, in The Celebrity:
        Now we plunged into a deep shade with the boughs lacing each other overhead, and crossed dainty, rustic bridges […] : or anon we shot into a clearing, with a colored glimpse of the lake and its curving shore far below us.
    2. To go over or pass quickly through.
      shoot the rapids
      • (Can we date this quote?) John Dryden
        She […] shoots the Stygian sound.
      • 2005, R. G. Crouch, The Coat: The Origin and Times of Doggett's Famous Wager (page 40)
        It was approaching the time when watermen would not shoot the bridge even without a passenger aboard.
    3. (transitive) To tip (something, especially coal) down a chute.
    4. (transitive) To penetrate, like a missile; to dart with a piercing sensation.
      a shooting pain in my leg
    5. (obsolete, intransitive) To feel a quick, darting pain; to throb in pain.
      • (Can we date this quote?) George Herbert
        These preachers make / His head to shoot and ache.
    6. (obsolete) To change form suddenly; especially, to solidify.
    7. To send out or forth, especially with a rapid or sudden motion; to cast with the hand; to hurl; to discharge; to emit.
    8. (informal, transitive) To send to someone.
      I'll shoot you an email with all the details
  3. (sports) To act or achieve.
    1. (wrestling) To lunge.
    2. (professional wrestling) To deviate from kayfabe, either intentionally or accidentally; to actually connect with unchoreographed fighting blows and maneuvers, or speak one's mind (instead of an agreed script).
    3. To make the stated score.
      In my round of golf yesterday I shot a 76.
  4. (surveying) To measure the distance and direction to (a point).
  5. (transitive, intransitive, colloquial) To inject a drug (such as heroin) intravenously.
  6. To develop, move forward.
    1. To germinate; to bud; to sprout.
      • (Can we date this quote?) Francis Bacon
        Onions, as they hang, will shoot forth.
      • (Can we date this quote?) John Dryden
        But the wild olive shoots, and shades the ungrateful plain.
    2. To grow; to advance.
      to shoot up rapidly
      • (Can we date this quote?) Edmund Spenser
        Well shot in years he seemed.
      • (Can we date this quote?) James Thomson
        Delightful task! to rear the tender thought, / To teach the young idea how to shoot.
    3. (nautical) To move ahead by force of momentum, as a sailing vessel when the helm is put hard alee.
    4. To push or thrust forward; to project; to protrude; often with out.
      A plant shoots out a bud.
      • Bible, Psalms xxii. 7
        They shoot out the lip, they shake the head.
      • (Can we date this quote by John Dryden?)
        Beware the secret snake that shoots a sting.
  7. To protrude; to jut; to project; to extend.
    The land shoots into a promontory.
    • 2019 February 5, Oliver Wainwright, “Super-tall, super-skinny, super-expensive: the 'pencil towers' of New York's super-rich”, in The Guardian‎[1]:
      There is 432 Park Avenue, a surreal square tube of white concrete that appears to shoot twice as high as anything around it, its endless Cartesian grid of windows framing worlds of solid marble bathtubs and climate-controlled wine cellars within.
    • 1836, Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers Chapter 49
      There shot up against the dark sky, tall, gaunt, straggling houses.
  8. (carpentry) To plane straight; to fit by planing.
    • 1677, Joseph Moxon, Mechanick Exercises: Or, The Doctrine of Handy-works
      two Pieces of Wood are Shot (that is Plained) or else they are Pared […] with a Pairing-chissel
  9. To variegate as if by sprinkling or intermingling; to color in spots or patches.W
    • (Can we date this quote?) Alfred Tennyson
      The tangled water courses slept, / Shot over with purple, and green, and yellow.
QuotationsEdit
Derived termsEdit
Terms derived from shoot (verb)
DescendantsEdit
TranslationsEdit
to sprout - of a plant
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.
Translations to be checked

NounEdit

shoot (plural shoots)

  1. The emerging stem and embryonic leaves of a new plant.
    • Evelyn
      Superfluous branches and shoots of this second spring.
  2. A photography session.
  3. A hunt or shooting competition.
  4. (professional wrestling, slang) An event that is unscripted or legitimate.
  5. The act of shooting; the discharge of a missile; a shot.
    • Francis Bacon
      The Turkish bow giveth a very forcible shoot.
    • Drayton
      One underneath his horse to get a shoot doth stalk.
  6. A rush of water; a rapid.
  7. (mining) A vein of ore running in the same general direction as the lode.
    (Can we find and add a quotation of Knight to this entry?)
  8. (weaving) A weft thread shot through the shed by the shuttle; a pick.
  9. A shoat; a young pig.
  10. An inclined plane, either artificial or natural, down which timber, coal, etc., are caused to slide; a chute.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for shoot in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.)

Derived termsEdit
DescendantsEdit
TranslationsEdit

Etymology 2Edit

Minced oath for shit.

InterjectionEdit

shoot

  1. A mild expletive, expressing disbelief or disdain
    Didn't you have a concert tonight?
    Shoot! I forgot! I have to go and get ready...
SynonymsEdit
TranslationsEdit
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables, removing any numbers. Numbers do not necessarily match those in definitions. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout#Translations.
Translations to be checked

AnagramsEdit

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