arming

Pluralarmings (some meanings)

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of arm.

   The government began arming its border guards after the raids.

   Arming civilians during the siege proved deeply controversial.

   Note

   Two jobs share one spelling here: the progressive verb (the guards were arming) and the gerund (arming civilians proved controversial). The gerund takes a direct object. Once "the" and "of" appear, as in the arming of civilians, it has become the noun for supplying weapons, which also has a plural, armings. Used intransitively, it can describe a device readying itself: the system is arming.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   The act of supplying oneself or others with weapons, ammunition, and armor in preparation for conflict; the provision of the means of defense and attack.

   The arming of the rebels with modern rifles shifted the balance of power.

   International observers condemned the rapid arming of both sides in the dispute.

   Similararmament, militarization

   Oppositedisarmament, demilitarization

   Note

   Middle English armyng, and the word has drifted with warfare: once chiefly armor, now chiefly weapons and ammunition. Literary scholars keep the older picture alive in "the arming of the hero," the set piece of war epic. Albert Bates Lord treats the armings of Paris and Agamemnon, plural, as recurring scenes. In current prose it usually takes of plus the side supplied: the arming of rebels.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   The act of preparing a tool or weapon for action; the activation that makes it ready to function.

   The arming of the warhead requires two separate codes entered in sequence.

   Engineers test the arming of each detonator before deployment.

   Similaractivation, priming

   Oppositedeactivation

   Note

   In ordnance language it means making a device live, not equipping anyone: the arming of a fuze when fired, the arming of a missile's warhead. The phrase can be ambiguous. The arming of the missiles might mean supplying weapons or switching them on, and talk of fuzes, codes or timing usually decides which. Its plain equivalent is activation.

4. 4
   noununcountable

   The process of equipping a person or group for a particular task, whether with tools, knowledge, authority, or other means.

   The mentorship program focused on the arming of young leaders with practical knowledge.

   Legal reform meant the arming of citizens with new rights and protections.

   Similarequipping, empowerment

   Note

   The figurative extension of the military sense keeps that sense's construction: the arming of someone with something. What follows with is rarely a weapon. It is knowledge, information, a record book, spoken English. A faint martial edge survives, which suits it to prose about campaigns, advocacy and preparation for a struggle.

5. 5
   nouncountable or uncountablein compounds

   The act of affixing and securing armor in place on the body.

   The squire assisted with the arming, buckling each plate into place.

   A full arming of plate armor could take nearly an hour.

   Note

   Here the word turns attributive and names the kit that holds armor on the body: arming doublet, arming points, arming straps, arming buckle. An arming doublet was a garment the armor was anchored to, which is why Planché's Cyclopaedia of Costume (1819) lists "laces for arming" among the gear. Unlike the broader supplying sense, this is the squire's work of buckling on.

6. 6
   nouncountable

   A piece of tallow or soap placed in the hollow at the bottom of a sounding lead to pick up samples from the sea floor.

   Like pressing putty against a surface to take an impression of it.

   The leadsman renewed the arming each time before sounding the depth.

   Grains of sand clinging to the arming revealed a sandy bottom.

   Note

   A navigator's word from the days of the hand lead. The line gave the depth, but the arming gave the character of the bottom: when the lead struck, sand, shell or mud stuck to the tallow and could be examined. H. G. Mowat's Captain Carteret and the Voyage of the Swallow reads the nature of the sea bed from it.

7. 7
   nouncountableplural

   One of the red cloths formerly hung along a ship's sides for decoration on holidays or used to screen the crew from view during battle.

   On the king's birthday, an arming was draped along each side of the ship.

   The gun crews worked behind the armings, hidden from the enemy's view.

   Note

   Usually met in the plural, armings, because the cloths were hung as a set fore and aft. The double use is telling: the same red cloth dressed a ship for a holiday and hid its crew in action. Keep it distinct from the tallow in a sounding lead, the other shipboard arming.

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