# helmet

Pronunciation: say "HEL-mit" /ˈhɛlmɪt/

## Noun

1. A hard protective covering for the head, often forming part of a suit of armor.
   - Simple: A hard cover worn on the head to protect it from injury.
   - _The soldier's steel helmet deflected the blow._
   - _Medieval knights wore helmets crafted from iron plates._
3. Anything that resembles a helmet, whether in its shape, its position, or in some other respect.
   - Simple: Something that is like a helmet in its shape, its place, or in some other way.
   - _Years of hairspray had set her silver curls into a stiff, unmoving helmet._
   - _The chapel's bell tower ends in a rounded copper helmet, green with age._
4. The rounded head at the tip of the penis.
   - Simple: The rounded tip of the penis.
   - _The new piercing sat just behind the helmet._
   - _Friction had left the helmet tender and red._
5. A contemptible or stupid person, used as a mild insult.
   - Simple: A foolish or contemptible person, used as an insult.
   - _Only a complete helmet would lock his keys in the car twice in one day._
   - _Some helmet had parked across two spaces again._

## Verb

2. To cover with a helmet, or with something that works like one.
   - Simple: To put a helmet on someone or something, or to cover it the way a helmet does.
   - _Soldiers helmet their heads before entering the battlefield._
   - _The engineers helmeted the sensor to shield it from flying debris._

## Other meanings

- (noun) Such a helm when placed above a shield on a coat of arms.
- (noun) The hood-shaped upper sepal or petal of some flowers, as of the monkshood or the snapdragon.
- (noun) A naked shield or protuberance on the top or fore part of the head of a bird.
- (noun) The upper part of a chemist's retort.

## Origin

From Middle English helmet, borrowed from Old French helmet (a diminutive of helme, Modern French heaume), equivalent to helm plus -et. The Old French word was itself of Germanic origin, and helmet has been used in English since the 15th century, largely replacing helm as the general word.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/helmet (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).