dart
UK/dɑːt//dɑɹt/
dart noun: a pointed missile weapon, intended to be thrown by the hand; for example, a short lance or javelin.
Noun (1)
dart (plural darts)
- A pointed missile weapon, intended to be thrown by the hand; for example, a short lance or javelin.
- Then said Joab, I may not tarry thus with thee. And he took three darts in his hand, and thrust them through the heart of Absalom, while he was yet alive in the midst of the oak.1769, Oxford Standard Text, “King James Bible”, in 2 Samuel, xviii, 14
- Any sharp-pointed missile weapon, such as an arrow.
- Anything resembling such a missile; something that pierces or wounds like such a weapon.
- The artful inquiry, whose venom′d dart / Scarce wounds the hearing while it stabs the heart.1830, Hannah More, Sensibility: The Works of Hannah More, volume 1, page 38
- A small object with a pointed tip at one end and feathers at the other, which is thrown at a target in the game of darts.
- A concave quadrilateral similar in shape to a chevron or arrowhead.
- A cigarette.
- The Tigers will also face Jesse Hogan, still smarting from missing a couple of games but not life inside the AFL bubble, where you can’t even light up a dart at a music festival without someone filming it and sending it to the six o’clock news.2017, April 18, Craig Little, The Guardian, Hawthorn are not the only ones finding that things can get worse
- A dart-shaped target towed behind an aircraft to train shooters.
- Fighter aircraft also use restricted areas for target shooting at darts towed 1500 feet behind another aircraft.1988, Michigan Aviation, volumes 21-25, page 62
- A plan or scheme.
- Trucking′s my dart too.1947, Norman Lindsay, Halfway to Anywhere, published 1970, page 79
- A sudden or fast movement.
- Soon as I felt the floor tremor I made a dart for the door.
- Six minutes later Cueto went over for his second try after the recalled Mike Tindall found him with a perfectly-timed pass, before Ashton went on another dart, this time down his opposite wing, only for his speculative pass inside to be ruled forward.2011 September 24, Ben Dirs, “Rugby World Cup 2011: England 67-3 Romania”, in BBC Sport
- A fold that is stitched on a garment.
- Somehow she managed, with a cinched waist here and a few darts there, to look like a Hollywood star.2013, “Nadia Popova”, in The Economist
- A dace (fish) (Leuciscus leuciscus).
- Any of various species of hesperiid butterfly.
Verb
dart (third-person singular simple present darts, present participle darting, simple past and past participle darted)
- To throw with a sudden effort or thrust; to hurl or launch.
- To send forth suddenly or rapidly; to emit; to shoot.
- As the sun darted forth his beams, she darted a meaningful glance at me.
- Pan came, and ask'd, what magic caus'd my ſmart, / Or what ill eyes malignant glances dart?1717, Alexander Pope, “Autumn. The Third Pastoral. […]”, in The Works of Mr. Alexander Pope, volume I, London: […] W[illiam] Bowyer, for Bernard Lintot, […], →OCLC, page 28
- To shoot with a dart, especially a tranquilizer dart.
- They had to dart the animal to get close enough to help
- To fly or pass swiftly, like a dart; to move rapidly in one direction; to shoot out quickly.
- The flying man darted eastward.
- To start and run with speed; to shoot rapidly along.
- The deer darted from the thicket.
- The fish darted under a stone.
Noun (2) capitalized: DART
DART (plural DARTs)
- Acronym of disaster assistance response team.
- Disaster animal response team.
- Disaster area response team.
- Abbreviation of disaster assistance and rescue team.
- Disaster response team.
Proper noun (1) capitalized: DART
DART
- Acronym of Dublin Area Rapid Transit.
- Acronym of Dallas Area Rapid Transit.
Proper noun (2) capitalized: Dart
Dart
- A river in Devon, England, which flows from Dartmoor to the English Channel at Dartmouth.
- An unincorporated community in Washington County, Ohio, United States, said to be named for a bird flying like a dart.
Proper noun (3) capitalized: Dart
Dart (plural Darts)
- A surname from Middle English.
Noun (3) capitalized: Dart
Dart (plural Darts)
- An officer trained at Britannia Royal Naval College, Dartmouth, England.
Proper noun (4) capitalized: DArT
DArT
- Acronym of Diversity arrays technology (“a genetic marker technique”).
dart meaning in Punjabi, Gujarati, Odia and Nepali
dart in Punjabi
- ਡੌਰਟ ਕਰਨ ਲਈ, ਡੋਰਟ ਕਰਨ ਲਈ
dart in Gujarati
- ડાર્ટ કરવા માટે, ડાર્ટ કરવા
dart in Odia
- ଡାର୍ଟ କରିବା ପାଇଁ
dart in Nepali
- डार्ट गर्न, डोर्ट गर्न
More languagesFewer languages
- dart in Arabic
- خزاقة xizāqa
- dart in Persian
- خشت xešt, ناوک nâvak, دارت dârt
- dart in Thai
- ลูกดอก lûuk-dɔ̀ɔk
Examples of dart in a sentence
- Messi, again, was prominently involved, darting past Fernando and then Zabaleta.2015 February 24, Daniel Taylor, “Luis Suárez strikes twice as Barcelona teach Manchester City a lesson”, in The Guardian (London):
- The impressive Frenchman drove forward with purpose down the right before cutting infield and darting in between Vassiriki Diaby and Koscielny.2010 December 29, Mark Vesty, “Wigan 2 - 2 Arsenal”, in BBC:
Synonyms of dart
Forms of dart
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | darts |
| plural | DARTs |
| plural | Darts |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | darts |
| present participle | darting |
| past participle | darted |
| past | darted |
| Proper noun | |
| plural | Darts |
Origin of dart
From Middle English dart, from Old French dart, dard (“dart”), from Medieval Latin dardus, from Frankish *darōþu (“dart, spear”), from Proto-Germanic *darōþuz (“dart, spear”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰerh₃- (“to leap, spring”). Compare Old High German tart (“javelin, dart”), Old English daroþ, dearod (“javelin, spear, dart”), Swedish dart (“dart, dagger”), Icelandic darraður, darr, dör (“dart, spear”).
From Middle English darten, from the noun (see above).
From Proto-Brythonic *dar (“oak”). Cognate to the Darent.
Words formed from dart
- Dartmoor
- Dartmouth
- blowdart
- blue dart
- Cupid's dart
- dartball
- dartboard
- dartfish
- dart golf
- dart gun
- dartist
- dartitis
- dartlike
- darts
- dart sac
- dartsman
- dart snake
- dart tag
- dartwhite
- dingy dart
- egg and dart
- fairy dart
- grass-dart
- heart and dart
- javelin dart
- lawn dart
- love dart
- lung dart
- palm-dart
- poison dart frog
- poison dart plant
- rope dart
- sand dart
- sun-darts
- yard dart
- dart about
- darter
- dartle
- darty
- endart
- indart
- updart
Phrases with dart
Words that rhyme with dart
32 more rhymesFewer rhymes
Questions about dart
- What does dart mean?
- Dart means a pointed missile weapon, intended to be thrown by the hand; for example, a short lance or javelin.
- What is dart in Punjabi?
- Dart in Punjabi is ਡੌਰਟ ਕਰਨ ਲਈ, ਡੋਰਟ ਕਰਨ ਲਈ. See Dart meaning in Punjabi.
- How do you use dart in a sentence?
- Messi, again, was prominently involved, darting past Fernando and then Zabaleta.
- What part of speech is dart?
- Dart can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce dart?
- Dart is pronounced /dɑːt/ (UK).
- What is the plural of dart?
- The plural of dart is darts.
Words near dart in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: dart (page history and authors); DART (page history and authors); Dart (page history and authors); DArT (page history and authors); dart (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); dart (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); dart (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); dart (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-dart.ogg, EN-AU ck1 dart.ogg.
Cite this entry: “dart.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/dart. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.