potgun

English

Etymology

pot +‎ gun

Noun

potgun (plural potguns)

1. (obsolete) A pot-shaped cannon; a mortar.
   • 1589, Richard Hakluyt, The Principall Navigations, Voiages, and Discoveries of the English Nation, […], London: […] George Bishop and Ralph Newberie, deputies to Christopher Barker, […], →OCLC:

     twelve pot-guns of brass

2. (obsolete) A pop gun.
   • c. 1730, To Doctor D-l-y on the Libels writ against him, Jonathan Swift:

     When first in Print, you see him dread
     Each Pot-gun level'd at his Head

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “potgun”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)

Anagrams

• Gupton, top gun