skirmish
/ˈskɝmɪʃ/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.06 in modern English
17
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
2
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
Example Sentences
- "On 2 March, Chinese border guards with the help of regular PLA forces skillfully ambushed Strelnikov's unit on the ice near Chen Pao, killing him and 30 Soviets in the subsequent skirmish."
- "The walls are slitted with embrasures through which bowmen could fire, indicating that the belfry also served as a stronghold during border skirmishes."
- "Three people were arrested after a skirmish in a bar."
- "Fires which have heretofore been one‐alarm skirmishes are now multialarm small wars."
- "The deer and the pig and the nilghai were milling round and round in a circle of eight or ten miles radius, while the Eaters of Flesh skirmished round its edge."
- "Other historians might also remark that […] they have persisted all this time, constantly wrestling and skirmishing and yet never destroying themselves."
Etymology
From Middle English skirmish (as a verb), from Old French escarmouche (“skirmish”), from Italian scaramuccia, earlier schermugio. Doublet of escarmouche, Scaramouche, and Scaramucci.
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: skirmish, escarmouche, scaramuccia
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈskɝmɪʃ/
- British English: /ˈskɜːmɪʃ/