catapult

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A military machine for hurling missiles, such as large stones or spears, used in ancient and medieval times.
2. n. A mechanism for launching aircraft at a speed sufficient for flight, as from the deck of a carrier.
3. n. A slingshot.
4. v. To hurl or launch from or as if from a catapult.
5. v. To become catapulted; spring or bolt.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. In Roman antiquity, a military engine used to throw darts of great size, called phalarica or trifax. Its construction is nowhere explained with any fullness, and it is uncertain whether its action was that of a crossbow or whether springs were the propelling power. By later authors the catapult and ballista seem to be confounded. In the middle ages the name is hardly used, except where a writer is evidently seeking to give a classical form to his composition. In the annexed cut, which represents a catapult of the later period when no distinction was made between it and the ballista, F is the end of a strong lever, which revolves on an axis and is held down by a windlass, A. At the extremity is a fork, E E, with the prongs curving slightly upward so as to afford a bed for a barrel of combustible matter or a heavy missile confined by a rope with a loop at the end, the loop being passed through a hook, D. When the lever was released it bounded suddenly upward, the centrifugal force causing the loop C to slip off the hook, whereupon the barrel held on the fork was liberated and projected toward its object. B shows rings of iron, stone, or lead, intended to increase the rebound due to the stretched cables or other devices which furnished the propelling force.
2. n. A small forked stick to each prong of which is attached an elastic band, generally provided with a piece of leather in the middle, used by boys for throwing small missiles, such as stones, peas, paper pellets, and the like.
3. To hurl, as a missile, as from a catapult.
4. To shoot at with a catapult: as, to catapult birds.
5. To use a catapult in hurling missiles.

Wiktionary

1. n. A device or weapon for throwing or launching large objects, such as a mechanical aid on aircraft carriers designed to help airplanes take off from the flight deck.
2. n. UK slingshot
3. n. An instance of firing a missile from a catapult.
4. n. figuratively An instance of firing something, as if from a catapult.
5. v. transitive To fire a missile from a catapult.
6. v. transitive To fire or launch something, as if from a catapult.
7. v. transitive To increase the status of something rapidly.
8. v. intransitive To be fired from a catapult or as if from a catapult.
9. v. intransitive To have one's status increased rapidly.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. (Mil. Antiq.) An engine somewhat resembling a massive crossbow, used by the ancient Greeks and Romans for throwing stones, arrows, spears, etc.
2. n. A forked stick with elastic band for throwing small stones, etc.

WordNet 3.0

1. v. shoot forth or launch, as if from a catapult
2. n. a device that launches aircraft from a warship
3. v. hurl as if with a sling
4. n. an engine that provided medieval artillery used during sieges; a heavy war engine for hurling large stones and other missiles
5. n. a plaything consisting of a Y-shaped stick with elastic between the arms; used to propel small stones