Word.ws English Dictionary

war-horse

war-horse is the alternative form of warhorse.

Meaning of warhorse

Noun

warhorse (plural warhorses)

  1. (historical) Any horse used in horse-cavalry, but especially one bearing an armoured knight.
    • Just within the inner edge of the circle stood a soldier, in the military attire of a strange nation; and without it was his warhorse, in the center of a collection of mounted domestics, seemingly in readiness to undertake some distant journey.1826, [James Fenimore Cooper], The Last of the Mohicans; a Narrative of 1757. […], volume II, Philadelphia, Pa.: H[enry] C[harles] Carey & I[saac] Lea— […], →OCLC
    Synonyms:
    battlehorse
  2. (figuratively, informal) An experienced person who has been through many battles, situations or contests; someone who has given long service.
    • Near-synonym: workhorse
  3. A regularly revived theatrical or musical work, as with Hamlet or a Beethoven symphony, or as excerpts thereto. May imply that the work in question has become hackneyed.
    • a Wagner warhorse

Forms of war-horse

pluralwar-horses

Questions about war-horse

What is war-horse the alternative form of?
War-horse is the alternative form of warhorse.

Words near war-horse in the dictionary

  1. war-driving
  2. war-game
  3. war-hero
  4. war-horn
  5. war-horns
  6. war-horse
  7. war-horses
  8. war-king
  9. war-kings
  10. war-mask
  11. war-masks

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: war-horse (page history and authors); warhorse (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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Cite this entry: “war-horse.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/war-horse. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.