▪ I. blunderbuss
(ˈblʌndəbʌs)
Also 7 blunderbush, 7–8 -bus.
[ad. Du. donderbus with same meaning, f. donder thunder + bus gun (orig. box, tube); perverted in form after blunder (perhaps with some allusion to its blind or random firing).]
1. A short gun with a large bore, firing many balls or slugs, and capable of doing execution within a limited range without exact aim. (Now superseded, in civilized countries, by other fire-arms.)
| 1654 Gayton Fest. Notes iv. xi. 244 In the antient wars, before these Bomards, Blunderbushes, Peters. 1657 S. Colvil Whigs Supplic. (1751) 25 A blunderbush hang'd at his back, Of terrible report and crack. 1682 Luttrell Brief Rel. (1857) I. 164 Two of which fired two blunderbusses at him, charg'd with severall shott. 1774 Mrs. Delany Life & Corr. Ser. ii. (1862) II. 60 Lord Berkeley..attacked by a Highwayman..shot him with a blunderbuss. 1808 Syd. Smith Plymley's Lett. x, A tithe procter in Ireland collects his tithes with a blunderbuss. 1863 Kingsley Water-Bab. viii. 329 A tremendous old brass blunderbuss charged up to the muzzle with slugs. |
2. transf. † a. A blustering noisy talker (obs.). b. A blundering fellow, a blunderhead.
| 1685 Answ. Dk. Buckhm. on Lib. Consc. 23 Securing the Person of his Prince, and the Peace of his Country from Religious Rumbalds, and Conventicling Blunderbusses. 1692 Washington tr. Milton's Def. Pop. Pref. (1851) 18 Not such a hair-brain'd Blunderbuss as you. 1706 Refl. on Ridicule 129 Those blunderbusses that talk loud and long. 1768 Tucker Lt. Nat. I. 475 He must be a numskull, not to say a beetle, nor yet a blunderbuss. |
† 3. ? A blunder; trouble. Obs. rare.
| 1726 Amherst Terræ Fil. xlviii. 259 More horrors still! Yea, verily! & a new blunderbuss into the bargain. |
4. attrib.
| 1864 R. Burton Dahome II. 76 The Agbary or blunderbuss-women are the biggest and strongest of the force. |
▪ II. ˈblunderbuss, v.
To shoot with a blunderbuss.
| 1870 Daily News 4 June, The risk of being pistolled or blunderbussed by a patriot. |