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Cannon   /kˈænən/   Listen
noun
Cannon  n.  (pl. cannons, collectively cannon)  
1.
A great gun; a piece of ordnance or artillery; a firearm for discharging heavy shot with great force. Note: Cannons are made of various materials, as iron, brass, bronze, and steel, and of various sizes and shapes with respect to the special service for which they are intended, as intended, as siege, seacoast, naval, field, or mountain, guns. They always aproach more or less nearly to a cylindrical from, being usually thicker toward the breech than at the muzzle. Formerly they were cast hollow, afterwards they were cast, solid, and bored out. The cannon now most in use for the armament of war vessels and for seacoast defense consists of a forged steel tube reinforced with massive steel rings shrunk upon it. Howitzers and mortars are sometimes called cannon. See Gun.
2.
(Mech.) A hollow cylindrical piece carried by a revolving shaft, on which it may, however, revolve independently.
3.
(Printing.) A kind of type. See Canon.
Cannon ball, strictly, a round solid missile of stone or iron made to be fired from a cannon, but now often applied to a missile of any shape, whether solid or hollow, made for cannon. Elongated and cylindrical missiles are sometimes called bolts; hollow ones charged with explosives are properly called shells.
Cannon bullet, a cannon ball. (Obs.)
Cannon cracker, a fire cracker of large size.
Cannon lock, a device for firing a cannon by a percussion primer.
Cannon metal. See Gun Metal.
Cannon pinion, the pinion on the minute hand arbor of a watch or clock, which drives the hand but permits it to be moved in setting.
Cannon proof, impenetrable by cannon balls.
Cannon shot.
(a)
A cannon ball.
(b)
The range of a cannon.



Cannon  n., v.  (Billiards) See Carom. (Eng.)



verb
Cannon  v. i.  
1.
To discharge cannon.
2.
To collide or strike violently, esp. so as to glance off or rebound; to strike and rebound. "He heard the right-hand goal post crack as a pony cannoned into it crack, splinter, and fall like a mast."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Cannon" Quotes from Famous Books



... woody hills, nothing but hills, brooks, woods all round; Hollow scooped out as if for the purpose; and altogether of inviting character to Konigseck. There, "Wednesday, April 20th," Konigseck posts himself, plants batteries, fells abatis; plenty of cannon, of horse and foot, and, say all soldiers, one of the ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVIII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great--Seven-Years War Rises to a Height.--1757-1759. • Thomas Carlyle

... boys, that man went right around here for twenty years, yes and more, all around this town, all around Petersburg, up at Old Salem, all over the country, practicing law, walking along the streets with people, talkin' with 'em on the corners, sittin' by 'em by the cannon stove in the offices of the hotels, sleepin' in the same rooms with 'em, as he did up at Petersburg at the Menard House, when the grand jury had the loft and they put Lincoln up there too, because there was no other place to ...
— Mitch Miller • Edgar Lee Masters

... krankbesoeckers, or visitors of the sick, who read sermons to an assembled congregation every Sunday. The first church at Albany was much like the Plymouth fort, simply a blockhouse with loop-holes through which guns could be fired. The roof was mounted with three cannon. It had a seat for the magistrates and one for the deacons, and a handsome octagonal pulpit which had been sent from Holland, and which still exists. The edifice had a chandelier and candle sconces and two low galleries. The first church in New Amsterdam ...
— Home Life in Colonial Days • Alice Morse Earle

... bringing earth out of my cave, and laying it at the foot of the wall, and walking upon it; and through the seven holes I contrived to plant the muskets, of which I took notice that I had got seven on shore out of the ship; these I planted like my cannon, and fitted them into frames, that held them like a carriage, so that I could fire all the seven guns in two minutes' time: this wall I was many a weary month in finishing, and yet never thought myself ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe Of York, Mariner, Vol. 1 • Daniel Defoe

... his pipe again before we left the boat, and pulled at it nervously and wrinkled his black skin into countless puckers as he walked beside us, thinking of the vast interests at stake and listening to our excited conversation. As we left him to go over to the town for a small cannon we had borrowed to fire the signals, he touched Walter on the sleeve, and said in the most slow and earnest manner, as he drew the pipe from his mouth and knocked its ashes on ...
— Captain Mugford - Our Salt and Fresh Water Tutors • W.H.G. Kingston


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