fireship
fireship noun: a wooden ship set alight and then sent floating into an enemy flotilla, with the aim of spreading the fire among them.
Noun
fireship (plural fireships)
- A wooden ship set alight and then sent floating into an enemy flotilla, with the aim of spreading the fire among them.
- Fireships were famously used by Sir Francis Drake when fighting the Spanish Armada of 1588.
- His attempt in 208 to cross the Yangtse was frustrated in the famous battle of Ch'ih-pi, in which his immense fleet was destroyed by his enemies' fireships, and most of his army slain.1984, Witold Rodzinksi, The Walled Kingdom: A History of China from 2000 BC to the Present, London: Fontana Paperbacks, →ISBN, →OCLC, →OL, page 69
- Synonyms:
- brulot
- A diseased prostitute.
Synonyms of fireship
Forms of fireship
| plural | fireships |
|---|---|
| alternative form | fire-ship |
| alternative form | fire ship |
Origin of fireship
From fire + ship.
Questions about fireship
- What does fireship mean?
- Fireship means a wooden ship set alight and then sent floating into an enemy flotilla, with the aim of spreading the fire among them.
- What part of speech is fireship?
- Fireship is a noun.
- What is the plural of fireship?
- The plural of fireship is fireships.
Words near fireship in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: fireship (page history and authors). 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-au-fireship.ogg.
Cite this entry: “fireship.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/fireship. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.