Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To arrange (fortifications) in such a way as to give protection from enfilading and other fire.
- n. The act or procedure of defilading.
- n. A fortified position offering protection from enfilading and other fire.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- In fortification, to arrange the plan and profile of (a fortification) so as to protect its lines from enfilading fire, and its interior from plunging or reverse fire. Also defile.
- n. That arrangement of a fortification by means of which its interior is concealed from an adversary on a neighboring height.
Wiktionary
- v. transitive To fortify something as a protection from enfilading fire.
- n. A fortification having such protection.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. (Mil.) To raise, as a rampart, so as to shelter interior works commanded from some higher point.
WordNet 3.0
- n. the arrangement of defensive fortifications to protect against enemy fire
Etymologies
- de- + (en)filade. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“And, again, quite prominent pieces of terrain where you can have good what's called defilade fire but you have to be very careful about being isolated.”
“I backed my way across the river with rifle leveled and took up a defilade and waited ...”
“I will tell you now that I shot only once in my military career, and that in so doing I murdered the woolen hat of my sergeant which he had lost leaping into a nearby defilade.”
“Swagger started to rotate right, to get around the bumpers of both cars, flank the shooter, and take him down from the low defilade, even as he knew that if the guy was no idiot, he too would now be on the move, rotating also to the right.”
“Kitteh tank in defilade behine wall waitin for burdie squad to be lunches!”
Delta squad had no idea - Lolcats 'n' Funny Pictures of Cats - I Can Has Cheezburger?
“I've been setting up enfilade fire from defilade positions, with aspects of grazing/plunging speculative fire suppression all morning.”
“The tanks and infantry should not go together because the tanks will be slowed down and the artillery fire that will fall on the tanks would cause casualties, and the infantry may be able to approach the objective from a direction unsuitable for tanks to take advantage of defilade. 37”
“Drilling and parading was well and good, but column advance, feint, enfilade and defilade—lot of use was that against the British Empire.”
“I knew where most of the latter were placed, since the best sites for artillery always seemed to be identical with those I chose to put my clearing companies in -- i.e., back of a division, near water, and with defilade (a hill facing away from the enemy so that their artillery passed over us).”
“Natural or manmade defilade provides the best cover from kinetic-energy direct fire munitions.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘defilade’.
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defense
shield, aegis, armor, cuirass, plastron, inured, reinforced, cataphract, proof, targus, buckler, shield bearer and 123 more...
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Iaan
dirigisme, dystopia, cacotopia, ex ante, veritable, indefatigable, curmudgeon, desultory, antediluvian, transmogrify, pendent, elongate and 268 more...
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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phrontistery - d
from phrontistery.info
dacnomania, dacoitage, dacryops, dactylioglyph, dactyliology, dactyliomancy, dactylogram, dactylography, dactyloid, dactylology, dactylomancy, dactylomegaly and 624 more...
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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colleen's words ii
sibilant, sundry, spindle, distaff, device, mortar, pestle, scythe, flail, thresh, frown, elementary and 495 more...
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azd's Words
adamantine, abatial, ablate, ablative, abrogate, accretive, acromegaly, acrostic, actinism, actinic, acuity, adduce and 968 more...
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ElRojo
R. Peter Jackson's list
cantillation, jackstaff, pullulate, whoremonger, colloquy, batman, anathema, idiosyncratic, facilitation, sympathy, empathy, satrap and 134 more...
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wordhoard
dilatory, ataraxia, hermit, cabana, hut, dome, vestigial, porcine, crapulous, usufruct, curmudgeon, bombastic and 229 more...
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Not Quite As Awful As They Sound
masticate, absquatulate, adumbrate, afflatus, fetial, anile, bilabial, cineaste, smew, copse, piebald, testudinate and 156 more...
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words
diplopic, dolorous, farrago, surety, scuttlebutt, Arabesque, infarct, neurasthenia, lambent, expurge, univocal, simper and 395 more...
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Words that make you go hmmmm...
Interesting words you probably won't hear in your day-to-day.
maxwell, mooncalf, quagga, glaikit, musquash, lingam, haruspex, qindarka, chthonic, ipomoea, azimuthal, valuta and 304 more...
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Words from Table Talk's "Five Words" ...
The 5 words contest is a parlor game where people respond to the challenge to come up with a sentence which contains 5 specified words determined by the challenger (and makes a degree of sense). Sa...
mirage, bedecked, breasts, prairie dog, canyon, eau-de-vie, kinkajou, xiphoid, oubliette, quorum, president, atrocities and 62 more...
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autrefois's Words
tassel, vespertine, susurrus, crepuscular, maddening, aureate, halcyon, happenstance, kismet, carousel, luscious, mendacious and 56 more...
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