rifle

CEFRB1

/ˈɹaɪfəl/

noun · verb

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    noun

    A long gun fired from the shoulder.

  2. 02

    verb

    To search through something quickly and carelessly.

Examples

  • A rifle shot broke the peace of the early morning.

  • Benjamin shot a bear with a rifle.

At a glance

Sits at B1 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
2
Citations
5
Synonyms
5

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings

  1. A rifleman.

  2. An artillery piece with a rifled barrel.

  3. A firearm fired from the shoulder; improved range and accuracy is provided by a long, rifled barrel.

More examples

In context

  • She made a mess when she rifled through the stack of papers, looking for the title document.

  • 2011 Fighting for Gold: The Story of Canada's Sledge Hockey Paralympic Gold by Lorna Schultz Schultz Nicholson But a Norwegian player rifled off a point shot that sailed into the back of the net.

  • Near-synonym: riffle

Synonyms

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

The hunter carried a long blank on his back during the expedition.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

noun

Originally short for “rifled gun”, referring to the spiral grooves inside the barrel. From Middle English riflen (“to rob, plunder, search through”), from Old French rifler (“to lightly scratch, scrape off, plunder”), from Old High German riffilōn (compare German riffeln (“to score, make grooves in, ripple”), archaic Dutch rijfelen (“to scrape”), Old English rifelan, riflian (“to wrinkle”)), frequentative of Proto-Germanic *rīfaną (compare Old Norse rífa (“to tear, break”)). More at rive.