Word.ws English Dictionary

spear

UK/spɪə̯(ɹ)//spɪɹ/

spear noun: a long stick with a sharp tip used as a weapon for throwing or thrusting, or anything used to make a thrusting motion.

spear: a long stick with a sharp tip used as a weapon for throwing or thrusting, or anything used to make...
Image: Lorenz Frølich, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun (1)

spear (plural spears)

  1. A long stick with a sharp tip used as a weapon for throwing or thrusting, or anything used to make a thrusting motion.
    • It's not like you killed someone
      It's not like you drove a spiteful spear into his side
      Talk to Jesus Christ as if he knows the reasons why
      He did it all for you2000, “Judith”, performed by A Perfect Circle
  2. (historical) A soldier armed with such a weapon; a spearman.
    • Now toil'd the Bruce, the battle done ,
      To use his conquest boldly won;
      And gave command for horse and spear
      To press the Southron's scatter'd rear1815, Walter Scott, “(please specify the page)”, in The Lord of the Isles, a Poem, Edinburgh: […] [F]or Archibald Constable and Co. […]; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown; by James...
    • Two of the four spears came directly from Lady Margaret's staff. One was her great-nephew Maurice St John […].2011, Thomas Penn, Winter King, Penguin, published 2012, page 187
  3. A lance with barbed prongs, used by fishermen to retrieve fish.
  4. An illegal maneuver using the end of a hockey stick to strike into another hockey player.
  5. In professional wrestling, a running tackle in which the wrestler's shoulder is driven into the opponent's midsection.
  6. A shoot, as of grass; a spire.
  7. The feather of a horse.
  8. The rod to which the bucket, or plunger, of a pump is attached; a pump rod.
  9. A long, thin strip from a vegetable.
    • asparagus and broccoli spears

Verb

spear (third-person singular simple present spears, present participle spearing, simple past and past participle speared)

  1. (transitive) To pierce with a spear.
    • By the 1970s, herders were spearing rhinos and poisoning lions to protest the loss of their land to conservation, then represented by the independent Kenyan government.2012, Robin Reid, Savannas of Our Birth
  2. (broadly, transitive) To penetrate or strike with, or as if with, any long narrow object; to make a thrusting motion that catches an object on the tip of a long device.
    • Former teammate Derek Sanderson recalls that Maki hit Ted from behind as Green was clearing the puck from the Boston zone. Green turned to knock Maki down, but Maki speared him as he rose from the ice.2003, Stan Fischler, Shirley Fischler, Who's who in Hockey
  3. (gridiron football) To tackle an opponent by ramming into them with one's helmet.
  4. (intransitive) To shoot into a long stem, as some plants do.
    • you may prepare them for spearing by laying the Keys in Earth or Sand1707, J[ohn] Mortimer, The Whole Art of Husbandry; or, The Way of Managing and Improving of Land. […], London: […] J[ohn] H[umphreys] for H[enry] Mortlock […], and J[onathan] Robinson […], →OCLC
  5. (especially, obsolete, transitive) To ignore as a social snub.
    • The Monthly Magazine, Or, British Register for 1798 included an explanation by a reader of how the cut was carried out in his college days in a lengthy letter to the editor, signed by the pseudonym "Ansonius." In his rambling letter, Ansonius noted that when he was at college, " … if a man passed...27 September 2013, Kane, Kathryn, The Regency Redingote Blog The Cut: The Ultimate & Final Social Weapon
    Synonyms:
    blank, cut

Adjective

spear (not comparable)

  1. Male.
    • a spear counterpart
    • When I was young, I was so desperate I'd go looking on the spear side.2018, A Very English Scandal (TV series), episode 1
  2. Pertaining to male family members.
    • the spear side of the family

Noun (2)

spear (plural spears)

  1. The sprout of a plant, stalk
  2. (obsolete) A church spire.

Proper noun capitalized: Spear

Spear (plural Spears)

  1. An English surname transferred from the nickname or originating as an occupation.

spear meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

spear in Hindi

long stick with a sharp tip
भाला bhālā, शूल śūl, नेजा nejā, बरछा barchā, सूरी sūrī

spear in Tamil

ஈட்டி, வேல், குந்தம்

spear in Marathi

long stick with a sharp tip
भाला bhālā

spear in Urdu

long stick with a sharp tip
نیز nez
More languagesFewer languages
spear in Bengali
বর্শা borśa
spear in Telugu
శూలం śūlaṁ, బల్లెం balleṁ
spear in Malayalam
ഇട്ടി iṭṭi, കുന്തം kuntaṁ
spear in Kannada
ಸಬಳ sabaḷa
spear in Punjabi
ਸਾਂਗ sāṅg
spear in Gujarati
ભાલા
spear in Odia
ବର୍ଚ୍ଛା, ବର୍ଶା
spear in Sanskrit
ऋष्टि ṛṣṭí, शल्य śalya
spear in Sinhala
හෙල්ල hella
spear in Assamese
হানা hana, হনা hona
spear in Arabic
رُمْح rumḥ, حَرْبَة ḥarba
spear in Malay
lembing
spear in Indonesian
tombak
spear in Persian
نیزه neyze, ژوبین žôbin
spear in Thai
หอก hɔ̀ɔk
spear in Vietnamese
thương, giáo
spear in Myanmar
လှံ hlam

Examples of spear in a sentence

  • The warrior saw a chink in her enemy's armor, and aimed her spear accordingly.
  • The plant was named for its fancied resemblance to a Roman spear.
  • The symbol for the planet Mars is a stylized representation of the shield and spear of the god Mars.

All 40 example sentences with spear

Synonyms of spear

Antonyms

Forms of spear

Noun
pluralspears
Verb
third-person singular presentspears
present participlespearing
past participlespeared
pastspeared
Proper noun
pluralSpears

Plural of spear: spears

Origin of spear

From Middle English spere, sperre, spear, from Old English spere, from Proto-West Germanic *speru, from Proto-Germanic *speru, from Proto-Indo-European *sperH-. Cognates See also West Frisian spear, Dutch speer, German Speer, Old Norse spjǫr, *sparrô, Middle Dutch sparre (“rafter”), Old Norse sparri (“spar, rafter”), sperra (“rafter, beam”); also Latin sparus (“short spear”), Albanian ferrë (“thorn, thornbush”).

Alteration of spire, from Middle English spyre, spier, spir, from Old English spīr (“stalk of a plant, shoot, blade”). More at spire.

From Middle English spere (“spear”), from Old English spere (“spear”), variously intending a spearman, a spearmaker, or a person tall and thin in a way reminiscent of a spear.

Words formed from spear

Phrases with spear

6 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with spear

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about spear

What does spear mean?
Spear means a long stick with a sharp tip used as a weapon for throwing or thrusting, or anything used to make a thrusting motion.
What is spear in Hindi?
Spear in Hindi is भाला (bhālā), शूल (śūl), नेजा (nejā). See Spear meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is spear?
Spear can be a noun, a verb, an adjective or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce spear?
Spear is pronounced /spɪə̯(ɹ)/ (UK).
What is the plural of spear?
The plural of spear is spears.

Words near spear in the dictionary

  1. spean
  2. Spean Bridge
  3. speaned
  4. speaning
  5. speans
  6. spear
  7. spear biscuits
  8. spear carrier
  9. spear carriers
  10. spear catcher
  11. spear catchers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: spear (page history and authors); Spear (page history and authors); spear (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ഇട്ടി (Malayalam) (page history and authors); ಸಬಳ (Kannada) (page history and authors); ਸਾਂਗ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); spear (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); spear (Odia, 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-spear.ogg.

Cite this entry: “spear.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/spear. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.