spiked someone's guns
spiked someone's guns is the simple past and past participle of spike someone's guns.
Meaning of spike someone's guns
Verb
spike someone's guns (third-person singular simple present spikes someone's guns, present participle spiking someone's guns, simple past and past participle spiked someone's guns)
- To frustrate a person's efforts or designs; to undercut, to render helpless.
- But whatever the Russians may have felt (and, apparently, still do feel) about Shakespear, his superiors were delighted by the way he had so skilfully spiked the Tsar's guns by liberating his subjects.1990, Peter Hopkirk, The Great Game, Folio Society, published 2010, page 205
Questions about spiked someone's guns
- What is spiked someone's guns the simple past and past participle of?
- Spiked someone's guns is the simple past and past participle of spike someone's guns.
Words near spiked someone's guns in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: spiked someone's guns (page history and authors); spike someone's guns (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.
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