| 释义 |
▪ I. bomb, n.|bɒm, bʌm|
Forms: 6 bome, 7 bombe, bombo, boom(b, 7– bomb.
[a. F. bombe, ad. Sp. bomba (see first quot.), prob. f. bombo ‘a bumming or humming noise’:—L. bombus. The word is thus ultimately identical with boom. Cf. the earliest Eng. instance bome, directly from Sp.; also 17th c. bombo from Sp. or It. Variously pronounced: see the rimes: in the British army (bʌm) was formerly usual.]
†1. Transl. of Sp. bomba de fuego ‘a ball of wilde-fire,’ Minsheu. Obs.
1588R. Parke Hist. China (transl. fr. Span.) 65 They vse..in their wars..many bomes of fire, full of olde iron, and arrowes made with powder & fire worke, with the which they do much harme and destroy their enimies.
2. a. An explosive projectile consisting of a hollow iron sphere filled with gunpowder or some other charge, and fired by a fuse ignited in the act of discharge from the mortar; a bombshell; now generally called a shell. In modern use: a case filled with explosive, inflammable material, poison gas, or smoke, etc., fired from a gun, dropped from aircraft, or thrown or deposited by hand. Also freq. in Comb., as atomic bomb, flying bomb, gas bomb, incendiary bomb, etc. (see under the first elements).
1684Lond. Gaz. No. 1937/2 They shoot their Bombes near two Miles, and they weigh 250 English Pounds a piece. 1687Evelyn Mem. (1857) II. 275, I saw a trial of those devilish murdering, mischief-doing engines called bombs, shot out of the mortar-piece on Blackheath. 1687Rycaut Hist. Turks II. 196 The Turks threw..quantities of Bomboes and Stink-pots. 1692Siege Lymerick 5, 800 Carts of Ball and Boombs. Ibid. 6, 600 Booms. a1721Prior Alma iii. 369 The longitude uncertain roams, In spite of Whiston and his bombs. c1730Young Sea-Piece Poems (1757) I. 246 A thousand deaths the bursting bomb Hurls from her disembowel'd womb. 1829Southey Yng. Dragon iv, The hugest brazen mortar That ever yet fired bomb, Could not have check'd this fiendish beast As did that Holy Thumb. 1914Times 9 Oct. 6/5 A German aeroplane flew over the outskirts of Paris early this morning and threw several bombs. 1914Whitaker's Almanack 1915 821/2 Lieut. Marix, who also made an attack on the Dusseldorf shed, and by means of a bomb destroyed it. 1940Times 15 Aug. 4/3 Numerous direct hits with heavy calibre bombs were scored..and the crew of one aircraft whose bombs fell in a line across the main buildings, reported that one had hit and destroyed the main power house. Ibid. 17 Oct. 4/4 Almost as soon as the sirens sounded bombs fell in some districts in the London area. 1943Times Weekly 18 Aug. 18/4 About 10 tons of light demolition bombs, besides incendiary bombs, were scattered over a wide area.
b. (the) bomb (also Bomb), a pregnant expression for the atomic or hydrogen bomb, as used or to be used by any country as a weapon of war, and regarded as unique because of its utterly destructive effects.
[1932H. Nicolson Public Faces i. 23 True it was that their acute distaste for the bomb..did credit to their humanity, to their state of civilisation.] 1945Times 15 Aug. 5/5 (headline) Victory and the Bomb. 1959Sunday Times 5 Apr. 19/5 Twenty years ago, I mean: before the war, the Bomb, the satellites, the space-travellers and the nudist paradises. 1966Listener 20 Jan. 83/1 One of the most persistent fallacies of the..debate about nuclear weapons is the proposition that ‘the bomb’, as it has come to be called almost with affection, has put an end to war.
c. Short for radium bomb (radium b).
1930Brit. Med. Jrnl. 8 Feb. 232/2 The apparatus to be described was designed..to meet the problem of making..use of the 4 grams of national radium that had been lent to the hospital for use as a ‘bomb’.
d. A success (esp. in entertainment); also U.S., a failure. So phr. like a bomb and varr., with great speed; with considerable effectiveness or success. colloq.
1954Amer. Speech XXIX. 99 Like a bomb,..very fast. 1961New Yorker 28 Oct. 43/2 What had once been called a failure became a ‘bomb’. 1962Listener 11 Oct. 581/2 Leslie Crowther, introducing The Black and White Minstrel Show..from the Victoria Palace, remarked, ‘We're going like a bomb here.’ 1963The Beatles 5 Once, Paul McCartney and I played Reading as the Nurk Twins. Went down a bomb, I recall. 1967A. Diment Dolly Dolly Spy ii. 15 His straight-backed ‘visitor's’ chair, which for pure discomfort would have gone down a bomb with the Gestapo.
e. A large sum of money. slang.
1958F. Norman Bang to Rights ii. 79 There are not many bent screws the reason being that many of them are to honest or to scared to do any trafficing but the ones that do make a bomb. 1963M. Levinson Taxi! x. 122 Large original oil paintings..which, in cab-driver's language, looked as though they were ‘worth a bomb’. 1969A. E. Lindop Sight Unseen xxiv. 202 Can I have that instead of the five pounds? I might flog it for a bomb in me old age.
f. A (large) marijuana cigarette; = bomber 3 a. slang.
1960Times Lit. Suppl. 16 Sept. 589/4 The Scene is written by a junkie with a bee for bombs... Mr. Cooper, that is to say, was once a dope addict. 1967E. Wymark As Good as Gold xiv. 204 First they simply smoke marijuana... They refer to the smokes as sticks or bombs, depending on their size. 1968J. Hudson Case of Need iii. i. 173 Bombs... You know... Speed. Lifts. Jets. Bennies.
†3. A mortar, a shell-gun. Obs. rare—1.
1684J. Peter Siege Vienna 95 The enemy..play'd on us with their Cannon and Bombs.
†4.
a. A small war-vessel carrying mortars for throwing bombs. Called more fully bomb-galliot, bomb-ketch, bomb-ship, bomb-vessel, and bombard.
1704Lond. Gaz. No. 4029/3 Portsmouth Bomb. Ibid. No. 3992/3 Her Majesty's Ships the Mortar and Terror Bombs. 1747J. Lind Lett. Navy i. (1757) 21 Those who have the command of sloops, bombs, fireships. 1806Duncan Nelson 45 He proceeded with the Thunder bomb..to bombard the town. 1813Examiner 18 Jan. 47/1, 18 sloops—4 bombs.
b. An old car (see also quot. 1953). Austral. and N.Z. slang.
1953Baker Australia Speaks iv. 106 Bomb, an old car or motor cycle. 1961Coast to Coast 1959–60 120 Get out, buy yourself a car... Do as I did, start with a bomb and keep adding a bit and trading it in till you've got what you want. 1965M. Shadbolt Among Cinders xviii. 163 The car..wasn't much more than an old bomb. 1967F. Sargeson Hangover vii. 53 We had a job shoving her into the bomb.
5. (volcanic) bomb: a roundish mass of lava thrown out of a volcano.
1798,1833[see volcanic a. 1 c]. 1845Darwin Voy. Nat. xxi. (1852) 493, I noticed volcanic bombs, that is, masses of lava which have been shot through the air whilst fluid and have consequently assumed a spherical or pear-shape. 1878Huxley Physiogr. 193 Sometimes the masses of lava..fall as..volcanic bombs. 1956W. Edwards in D. L. Linton Sheffield 8 Tuffs are especially well seen in the Ashaver anticline,..and are dark green, brown, and purple well-bedded basaltic ashes with ‘bombs’ of basalt, limestone, and chert. 1969Nature 8 Nov. 557/2 Volcanic activity occurred at several places along this fracture and fresh bombs rest on the ice close to the edge of the chasm.
6. Comb., as bomb battery, bomb-bed, bomb-cart, bomb-chest, bomb-galliot, bomb-quay, bomb-ship, bomb-vessel; bomb-battered adj.; also in many obvious comb. relating to aerial bombs, as bomb-aimer, bomb-aiming, bomb-carrier, bomb-carrying, bomb-crater, bomb-damage, bomb-dropper, bomb-dropping, bomb-dump [dump n.4 1 c], bomb-load, bomb-maker, bomb-raid, bomb-release, bomb-thrower, bomb-throwing; bomb-damaged, bomb-pitted, bomb-shattered adjs.; bomb alley Service slang, an area repeatedly attacked by bombing; bomb bay, a compartment in an aircraft for holding bombs; bomb calorimeter (see quot. 1928); bomb-disposal, the removal and detonation of unexploded and delayed-action bombs; usu. attrib., esp. in bomb-disposal squad; bomb door, usu. in pl.: the movable covering of a bomb bay; bomb-happy a. colloq. [-happy], mentally affected by exposure to a bomb or shell explosion at close quarters; shell-shocked; hence bomb-happiness; bomb-lance, a harpoon with an explosive in its head; bomb line (see quot. 1944); bomb-rack, a rack (in an aircraft) for holding bombs; bomb run (also bombing run), the line of flight of bombing aircraft over the target; bomb sight (also bombing sight), a device for sighting the target in bombing from an aeroplane; so bomb-sighting vbl. n.; bomb-site, ground on which buildings, etc., have been destroyed by aerial bombing. See also bomb-ketch, bomb-proof, bomb-shell.
1935Meccano Mag. Oct. 577/2 The telegraphist is also acting as *bomb-aimer.
1937Jrnl. R. Aeronaut. Soc. XLI. 423 A stable platform for *bomb-aiming. 1942W. Simpson One of our Pilots is Safe ii. 18 We were..given an extra gun—firing downwards and backwards out of the bomb-aiming hatch.
1942Hutchinson's Pict. Hist. War 10 June–1 Sept. 263 The narrow stretch of water between the island of Pantellaria and Sicily, officially known as the Sicilian Channel, but called *Bomb Alley by the Navy and Merchant Service. 1945Ann. Reg. 1944 76 The inhabitants of the so-called ‘bomb alley’ had also suffered considerably.
1854J. Abbott Napoleon (1855) I. xxxiv. 533 Having fled from their *bomb-battered and burning dwellings.
1695Lond. Gaz. No. 3124/2 This day the *Bomb-Battery was begun.
1918Aeronaut. Insp. Directorate Data Bk. (Handley Page V/1500) 3 The *bomb bay is rectangular, and built entirely of spruce. 1934Flight 15 Feb. 156/1 Bombs are internally stowed in a bomb bay closed by doors controlled by the bomber.
c1850Rudim. Navig. (Weale) 100 The beams which support the *bomb-bed in bomb-vessels.
1902Encycl. Brit. XXVII. 444/1 The potential energy..is measured by the heat of combustion in the *bomb calorimeter. 1928A. B. Callow Food & Health 29 The apparatus used for this laboratory oxidation is a small calorimeter which is known as the bomb calorimeter, because the oxidation takes place inside a thick-walled vessel which in some ways resembles a bomb.
1928Gamble Story N. Sea Air Station vii. 109 The only standard *bomb-carriers in service at this period were the single 16-lb bomb and the 20-lb gear for two Hale 20-lb bombs. Ibid., Equipping all the machines with *bomb-carrying and release gear.
1712Lond. Gaz. No. 4970/2 Two *Bomb Carts..and five Pieces of Ordnance. 1755Gentl. Mag. XXV. 377 Bomb-carts, filled with necessaries for the camp, were likewise sent.
1704J. Harris Lex. Techn., *Bomb-chest, is a kind of chest, which being filled with Gunpowder and Bombs..is placed under Ground to blow it up into the Air, together with those that stand upon it.
1920Blackw. Mag. July 76/1 Ploughed up with *bomb-craters.
1941Partisan Rev. Nov.–Dec. 498, I can see no *bomb damage anywhere, except for a few churches. 1942Ann. Reg. 1941 328 Four galleries..being closed on account of bomb damage.
1945W. S. Churchill Victory (1946) 157 *Bomb-damaged houses in the London area. 1954R. Macaulay Last Lett. (1962) 150 It was one of the City churches very little bomb-damaged, I think. 1954‘N. Blake’ Whisper in Gloom I. vi. 77 A row of bomb-damaged houses.
1940War Illustr. 4 Oct. 338 The *Bomb Disposal Sections of the Royal Engineers whose job it is to dig up and destroy the time-bombs. Ibid. 6 Dec. 612 The bomb-disposal squads of the Royal Engineers..described..the removal of delayed-action bombs.
1939Meccano Mag. Mar. 150/3 Large *bomb doors cover the bottom of the fuselage.
1928Gamble Story N. Sea Air Station vii. 104 The last three machines were classified as ‘Gun Machines’ and ‘*Bomb Droppers’.
1910R. Ferris How It Flies xvii. 372 There have been many contests by aviators in ‘*bomb-dropping’.
1939R. Campbell Flowering Rifle vi. 148 Keep safe his *bomb-dump while our patience lasts. 1941Illustr. London News CXCVIII. 728/2 Bombing up the 'planes is the work of the armourers, who also have charge of the vast station bomb-dump.
1715Lond. Gaz. No. 5301/2 Some *Bomb Galliots.
1944J. H. Fullarton Troop Target iii. 29 Now, when ‘*bomb-happiness’ and the ‘jitterbugs’ threatened to touch the troop with palsied fingers.
1943San Francisco Chron. 1 Dec. 2/2 A barrage so incessant..that many troops of the crack 65th Nazy Division were rendered ‘*bomb happy’ and fell easy prisoners. 1944A. Jacob Traveller's War iv. 68, I was, in fact, slightly ‘bomb happy’.
1751Smollett Per. Pic. (1779) II. lxiv. 210 The entertainers landed at the *bomb-keys.
1883Fisheries Exhib. Catal. 199 The *bomb-lance, darting-bomb, and rocket-bomb. 1901F. T. Bullen Sack of Shakings 18 He took..an extra supply of bomb-lances, in the use of which he was an acknowledged expert. 1917Chambers's Jrnl. Sept. 590/1 This monster..was killed by a bomb-lance from a whale-boat.
1943L. Cheshire Bomber Pilot i. 9 On the large map on the wall was a red line; they called it the *bomblin[e], and it was supposed to represent the area behind which we could [not] bomb. 1944Times 17 Apr. 3/3 The ‘bomb line’—that is, the line ahead of the troops behind which aircraft supporting the ground forces should not drop their bombs. 1961W. Vaughan-Thomas Anzio ii. 23 We could not..pick up any feature we could recognise... We turned tail and flew disconsolately back over the bomb line.
1921Aeronaut. Jrnl. Mar. 166 The *bomb load of the standard..four-engined machines amounted to 3,000 kilograms.
1905Westm. Gaz. 19 June 5/1 The *bomb-makers..were inextricably trapped.
1943T. Horsley Find, Fix & Strike 15 Operating from *bomb-pitted aerodromes.
1917Advis. Comm. Aeronaut., Rep. & Mem. No. 378 Tests were made up at the request of the Air Board, who supplied drawings of a *bomb rack to carry two 112-lb. bombs. 1918Times (Engineering Suppl.) 26 Apr. 88/1 The bomb-racks in the covered-in passage..are capable of holding five 25-pounder bombs. 1944Times 23 May 4/2 The Spitfires..saw the German aircraft pass them at high speed with bomb-racks full.
1917‘Contact’ Airman's Outings 259 A daylight *bomb raid is seldom a complete failure. 1945W. S. Churchill Victory (1946) 29 Bomb-raid damage repairs in London.
1928Gamble Story N. Sea Air Station v. 87 Very little work had been done with *bomb releases. Ibid. vii. 110 Bomb-release gears. Ibid. xiii. 224 Bomb release-slips.
1941Science Digest Nov. 53/1 The pilot controls the ‘*bomb run’, which is the line of flight of the plane. 1944Hutchinson's Pict. Hist. War 12 Apr.–26 Sept. 30/2 The deliberate bomb run through the target flak itself.
1945H. Read Coat of Many Colours lxvi. 319 The *bomb-shattered ruins of human tenderness and faith. 1949M. Laski Little Boy Lost iii. xvi. 209 The emptiness of the bomb-shattered square.
1695Lond. Gaz. No. 3086/2 Having been to view the *Bomb ships in the Maese. 1806Duncan Nelson 136 The bomb-ship and schooner gun-vessels made their escape.
1917‘Contact’ Airman's Outings vii. 176 Owing to the difficulty of correct aim, before the advent of modern *bomb-sights, all the early raids were carried out from a low altitude. 1928Gamble Story N. Sea Air Station v. 87 Of the available bomb sights, the most practical and successful were those invented by Lieutenant Scott, U.S.N., and Zeiss.
1931Air Annual Brit. Empire 230 The platform is filled with navigation and *bomb-sighting equipment for the observer's use.
1945Daily Express 23 May 3/3 (caption) British workmen from a *bomb-site about 100 yards away. 1959Times 8 Dec. 5/6 Many of the bomb-site parks in central London are seldom full.
1891Pall Mall Gaz. 14 Dec. 5/2 The *bomb-thrower, who lost his life in attempting that of Mr. Russell Sage. 1916‘Boyd Cable’ Action Front 24 The bomb-thrower seized the missile quickly,..threw the bomb, and jumped back under cover.
1905Westm. Gaz. 13 May 7/2 The workmen [of St. Petersburg] practised shooting and *bomb-throwing. 1908Daily Chron. 14 Aug. 4/4 The attack from bomb-throwing airships is very little, if any, more alarming than from a gunboat.
1693Lond. Gaz. No. 2893/4 *Bomb vessels lately Launch'd. 1828Spearman Brit. Gunner (article), Bomb-Vessels.
Add:[2.] g. Amer. Football. A long, looping, forward pass.
[1955B. Oates Los Angeles Rams 51 That year Bob Waterfield and Elroy Hirsch had been the long-range bombers with, for example, a ninety-one yard touchdown in Chicago.] 1960Compl. Guide Prof. Football 88 (caption) Ralph Gugliemi..threw four TD bombs in '59. 1970Globe & Mail (Toronto) 28 Sept. 23/8 The bomb carried from the Packer end zone to the Atlanta 44. 1974Cleveland (Ohio) Plain Dealer 13 Oct. c13/2 Shaw High quarterback Greg Shields stung Shaker Heights twice on long bombs to pace Shaw to its first Lake Erie League victory of the season, 14-7. 1984J. Lawton All Amer. War Game ix. 113 A big bomb of a pass can illuminate the murkiest of games.
[6.] bomb factory colloq., a place where bombs are illegally manufactured or prepared, for use in terrorist activities.
1975Facts on File 20 Dec. 952/3 Police said that the arrest of the four had been instrumental in uncovering a London ‘*bomb factory’. 1976Southern Even. Echo (Southampton) 2 Nov. 3/4 Madden had said he heard from a stallholder in Kingsland market that a bomb factory had been found in Albion Towers. 1986Times 21 June 3/2 He had no idea the four people in the room were turning it into a bomb factory.
▸ bomb squad n. (a) a unit, usually a division of a police force or the armed forces, assigned to investigate the planting of (suspected) explosive devices and to neutralize them; (b) a terrorist group that plants explosive devices.
1910Chicago Daily Tribune 20 Sept. 1/5 Capt. Wood..organized a ‘*bomb squad’ more than a year ago to search for the bomb thrower. 1920Times 21 Sept. 10/4 Fischer came from Canada willingly in the company of two members of what is known as the New York ‘Bomb Squad’. 1992Daily Mirror 3 Oct. 2/4 The lost blueprint is the second Palace security scandal revealed by the Mirror, following yesterday's alert on the book lashed as a ‘guide’ for an IRA bomb squad. 2004Seattle Post-Intelligencer (Nexis) 12 June b3 A bomb squad ‘rendered the device safe’ and it was removed for investigation.
▪ II. bomb, v.|bɒm, bʌm|
[f. prec.]
1. trans.
a. To fire bombs at; to bombard.
1688I. Clayton in Phil. Trans. XVII. 984 The Town could never be Bomb'd by Land. a1704Sedley Poems Wks. 1722 I. 78 While you Bomb Towns in France. 1797Nelson in Nicolas Disp. (1846) VII. p. cxlvi, The intention of bombing us still goes on.
b. To attack with an explosive bomb placed or thrown for the purpose of destruction; (of aircraft) to attack with bombs from the air; to drop a bomb or bombs upon. So to bomb one's way: to advance by bombing; to bomb out: to clear by bombing; esp. in pa. pple. (see bombed out s.v. bombed ppl. a.2 1). Also transf.
1909Daily Chron. 25 Feb. 1/6 Attempts had been made..to bomb trains known to contain Europeans. 1915Draconian Apr. 1683/1 They bombed us periodically during the day and night. 1916‘Boyd Cable’ Action Front 174 He himself had known a line bombed out. a1917E. A. Mackintosh War, the Liberator (1918) 97 When we're bombing our way up the streets of Berlin. Ibid. 133 He turned to bomb the big dug-out. 1969Daily Tel. 17 Dec. 3/8 Hundreds of pigeons congregated in the area, ruining washing and ‘bombing’ children.
2. To throw with violence, let fly. dial.
3. to bomb up: to load (aircraft) with bombs.
1939Flight 28 Sept., (caption) ‘Bombing up’ a squadron of Ju 87s at Kitzingen-on-Main aerodrome. 1940Illustr. London News CXCVII. 308/1 The order has been given to ‘bomb up’ this hardy squadron of ‘Whitley’ bombers. 1943L. Cheshire Bomber Pilot i. 9 When we landed, the armourers were standing by to bomb up.
4. intr. To fail. Also const. out. slang (orig. U.S.).
1963Amer. Speech XXXVIII. 168 To fail to pass an examination: flunk.., flag, blow, bomb. 1966Listener 9 June 838/3 When a machine goes wrong it ‘bombs out’ and has to be ‘debugged’. 1968TV Times (Austral.) 10 Apr. 11/4 Everyone had expected it to be [good], so when it bombed it was a shock.
5. trans. To drug or dope (a racehorse). Austral. slang.
1950Austral. Police Jrnl. Apr. 110 To bomb, to dope. 1959Baker Drum 92 Bomb v., to dope a racehorse.
6. intr. To move or travel quickly. With advb. (phr.) slang.
1966R. Thorp Detective iv. 64 When my parents thought I was at Gloria's house..we were out bombing around town. 1969N. Cohn Pop from Beginning xi. 93 At weekends, they bombed up and down the coastline in their hotrods. 1974H. Evans et al. We learned to Ski 31 Nothing is more demoralizing for a beginner than having all the skiers in the resort bombing past him. 1982Barr & York Official Sloane Ranger Handbk. 97/2 Social life revolves around your clique..and dinner at each other's houses, weekends bombing off somewhere together in your young Sloane motors.
▪ III. bomb
obs. form of boom and bum. |