cannon fodder
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.27 in modern English
19
Scrabble Score
12
Letters
4
Syllables
8
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
An expendable minor character primarily included to make the protagonist(s) stand out.
Slang; Uncountable
Example Sentences
- ""A foolish old half-pay officer," boomed Sir Hilton. "Go back to your club, sir, and play bridge with other superannuated cannon-fodder, sir.""
- "Soviet communism is trying to make these nations into colonies, and to use their people as cannon fodder in new wars of conquest."
- "A Russian governor in Siberia has been confronted by angry citizens who blamed him for deploying a local riot police unit to Ukraine to become “cannon fodder”, a video clip circulating online showed."
- "It is arrogant to simply dismiss San Marino and say they should not be playing qualifiers at this level but it is hard to see what England and manager Southgate learned from this one-sided, rather soulless experience against a team who were little more than cannon fodder."
Etymology
Origin
- Source language: English
Word Breakdown
Usage
Subject
Wiktionary places this term in Military.