Arblast

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A powerful medieval crossbow that was drawn with a winch or crank and used to shoot bolts over long distances
2. An older type of heavy crossbow, mechanically spanned, that fired short arrows with great force in medieval warfare
3. A large bow mounted on a stock and tensioned by a mechanism, once a common weapon of siege and battlefield combat

Etymology: The crossbow's older name was built from two Latin pieces that describe its mechanism: "arcus", meaning "bow", and "ballista", the large siege-engine that hurled stones. Late Latin fused them into "arcuballista", a bow that throws like a ballista, and the Old French "arbaleste" carried that compound into the language of medieval Europe. English took the word in the form "arblast" and it survived in Middle English, when the weapon was becoming a common feature of warfare. The shape of the word shows how it passed through speakers: the original "arcu-" softened into "arbal-" as the term moved from Latin into French and then into English, and the sense of "bow" stayed buried in the first syllable.

Synonyms: arbalest, crossbow