† life-arrown.Obsolete a barbed arrow with a line attached, fired from a gun in order to establish communication with a vessel in distress; cf. life gunn., life-shotn.
ΚΠ
1868 Chambers's Encycl. X. 605/2 Colonel Delvigne, of the French army, invented a life-arrow..to be fired from an ordinary musket.
1885 Cassell's Encycl. Dict. IV. ii. 683/2Life-shot, a shot carrying a line, and used for the same purpose as a life-arrow.