dagger

Pluraldaggers

Formsdaggers, daggering, daggered

1. 1
   weaponnouncountable

   A stabbing weapon like a sword but with a short blade sharpened along both edges.

   He drew a dagger from his boot and lunged at the guard.

   Ornate daggers with jeweled hilts lined the walls of the armory.

   Similarknife, dirk

   Note

   A weapon built for the thrust: its point does the work, and its two sharpened edges set it apart from an ordinary knife. The word came into Middle English as daggere, probably from Old French dague. Francis Grose in 1786 called it the sword's constant companion since at least the days of Edward I, under names such as cultellum and misericorde.

2. 2
   stabverbtransitive

   To pierce with a dagger, or more generally to stab.

   The assassins planned to dagger the senator as he entered the hall.

   She daggered the sack of grain to see what was hidden inside.

   Similarstab, pierce, knife

3. 3
   printing marknouncountable

   The typographical mark †, a small symbol shaped like a cross.

   In the team photo caption, a dagger beside a player's name shows that he has since died.

   With the asterisk already taken, the typesetter used a dagger for the second footnote.

   Similarobelus, obelisk

   Note

   Printers also call this mark an obelus or an obelisk, and it has a fixed place in the order of footnote marks: after the asterisk, before the double dagger (‡). Beside a name it marks a death, and some dictionaries use it the same way on words, flagging one that has fallen out of use.

4. 4
   late scorenouncountable

   In basketball or American football, a late score that puts a team ahead or stretches its lead, making a win likely.

   His fourth-quarter touchdown was the dagger that sent fans streaming toward the exits.

   The guard buried a three-point dagger with 40 seconds left, all but ending the game.

   Note

   Sports commentary borrowed the weapon as a metaphor: the dagger is the late blow the other team cannot recover from. It is usually a single play, often a three-pointer or a touchdown, and the word fits only when that play all but settles the game. Players hit, bury or drain one, but a score that merely narrows a deficit never counts.

5. 5
   danceverbJamaicaintransitive

   To perform the dance known as daggering.

   Few dancers at the session could dagger with that much energy.

   Some promoters banned performers from daggering on stage.

   Note

   This verb belongs to Jamaica, where the dance it names is called daggering, the same spelling as the verb's own -ing form. Elsewhere a listener will first hear stabbing with a dagger, so a sentence using it should keep the dance in view: the music, the session, the stage. Among people who know the dance, it needs no such help.

6. 6
   ship timbernouncountable

   A timber set diagonally in the frame of a ship.

   The shipwright bolted a dagger diagonally across the frame timbers.

   Rot had softened the old daggers, and the hull had begun to sag.

   Note

   Shipbuilding has its own dagger, a separate word from the weapon: the name may come from diagonal, which is just how this timber sits. David Steel's The Elements and Practice of Naval Architecture describes one facing on to the poppets of the bilgeways and crossing them on the slant to keep them together.

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