cannon ball

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can·non·ball

also cannon ball (kăn′ən-bôl′)

1. A round projectile fired from a cannon.

2. A jump into water made with the arms grasping the upraised knees, usually intended to make a big splash.

3. Something, such as a fast train, that moves with great speed.

4. Sports A fast low serve in tennis.

intr.v. can·non·balled, can·non·ball·ing, can·non·balls

1. To travel with great speed.

2. To jump into water while grasping one's upraised knees with one's arms.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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Noun

cannon ball - a solid projectile that in former times was fired from a cannon

cannonball, round shot

projectile, missile - a weapon that is forcibly thrown or projected at a targets but is not self-propelled

References in classic literature ?

Again a head shot swiftly out, and the great Lion went rolling down the hill as if he had been struck by a cannon ball.

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They have brought cannon balls, broken ramrods, fragments of shell--iron enough to freight a sloop.

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"Well," said he, "I hardly know; we always liked to hear the trumpet sound, and to be called out, and were impatient to start off, though sometimes we had to stand for hours, waiting for the word of command; and when the word was given we used to spring forward as gayly and eagerly as if there were no cannon balls, bayonets, or bullets.

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General Charles Etienne Gudin, whose name is inscribed on the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, died aged 44 on August 22, 1812, after being hit by a cannon ball during Napoleon's unsuccessful invasion of Russia.

Remains of one of Napoleon's 1812 generals believed found in Russia

"All that remains from the scars of the battle is damage to the front door caused by a cannon ball!" There are eight bedrooms in the main property, a reception hall which was part of the original hall, a drawing room and a billiard room/ library.

Estate with Rhodri Mawr links: Yours for PS2.75m; 26.ACRE DOMESDAY BOOK PROPERTY UP FOR SALE

The large carved stone looks like a cannon ball but has been dated to the 13th century, more than 200 years before the introduction of gunpowder or cannons in Scotland.

Dig unearths catapult ball; AROUND THE UK

They had found a cannon ball, a cobbled surface, a variety of masonry work, pieces of medieval pottery and part of a cooking pot.

Cannon ball found in the remains of medieval farmstead

He experimented with projectiles and had success with a method that caused the cannon ball to spin, which helped to stabilise its trajectory.

After the recent creation of a memorial to Sir Henry Bessemer, IMechE archivist Karyn French looks back at the inventor's wide-ranging achievements

"A tall, slender woman with the demeanor of a grandmother and the mind of a Clarence Darrow." That was how Detroit Free Press writer Barbara Stanton described the lawyer taking on the Norfolk and Western Railroad in an effort to keep the Wabash Cannon Ball train operational in 1969.

"Sister Cannonball": the nun who shook up Adrian

With people of the present day also linking that vision to the Dakota Access pipeline in Cannon Ball, North Dakota, Jackson's account of the great medicine man's life, legacy, and spiritual journey is especially timely.--DAMON ORION

Black Elk: The Life of an American Visionary

Protesters demonstrate near the Standing Rock Sioux reservation in Cannon Ball, N.D., on Sept.