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Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. A missile having a straight thin shaft with a pointed head at one end and often flight-stabilizing vanes at the other, meant to be shot from a bow.
  2. n. Something, such as a directional symbol, that is similar to an arrow in form or function.
  3. v. To move like an arrow.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. A slender, generally pointed, missile weapon made to be shot from a bow. Arrows have nearly universally been made with a light, straight shaft of wood, fitted with feathers at the nock-end to steady the flight, and with a pointed head of various forms, often barbed so as to remain fixed in the object pierced. Those used in the middle ages rarely had barbed heads; sometimes the head was flat, sometimes conical, and fitted to the shaft like the ferrule of a walking-stick. The arrow-heads of the North American Indians were of flint, obsidian, or other hard stone, or of bone, as well as of metal, and were often barbed. They were secured to the shaft by lashings of hide or sinew. Arrow-heads intended to be poisoned, as among South American Indians, are said to be fastened lightly, so as to leave the shaft and remain in the wound. The feathers at the butt of the shaft seem to have been generally used in all ages, and are so set, or are of such a form, as to give to the arrow a rotary movement, like that of a rifle-ball. The arrow of the crossbow is called a bolt or quarrel (which see).
  2. n. Anything resembling an arrow. In surveying a small pointed iron rod, or a stick shod with iron, stuck into the ground to mark a chain's length.
  3. To grow up into a long pointed stalk like an arrow.
  4. To move swiftly, as an arrow.
  5. To blossom: said particularly of sugar-cane, which throws out an arrowlike flowering; stalk.

Wiktionary

  1. n. A projectile consisting of a shaft, a point and a tail with stabilizing fins that is shot from a bow.
  2. n. A sign or symbol used to indicate a direction (eg. \to).
  3. n. A directed edge.
  4. v. To move swiftly and directly (like an arrow)
  5. adv. Contraction of term term, term term.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. A missile weapon of offense, slender, pointed, and usually feathered and barbed, to be shot from a bow.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. a mark to indicate a direction or relation
  2. n. a projectile with a straight thin shaft and an arrowhead on one end and stabilizing vanes on the other; intended to be shot from a bow

Etymologies

  1. Middle English arwe, from Old English.

Examples

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‘arrow’ has been looked up 1396 times, loved by 1 person, added to 15 lists, and has a Scrabble score of 8.