armed

Equipped, especially with a weapon.

Adjective in compounds, sometimes

  1. Equipped, especially with a weapon.
    • nuclear-armed

    1. (of a person, specifically) Equipped with a gun.

      • The violence began when Serbian troops went into Croatia ostensibly to aid armed ethnic Serbians trying to create their own autonomous states there. - 2015 February 3, Greg Botelho, “U.N. court: Serbs’ actions in...
  2. Prepared for use; loaded.
  3. Furnished with something that serves to add strength, force, or efficiency.
    • a distemper eminently armed from heaven - 1722, Daniel Defoe, A Journal of the Plague Year:
    • The naked eye then will immediately direct us, by means of the two stars just mentioned, towards the place where, in the finder, the armed eye will perceive the double star in question about ¾ degree from the 44th...
  4. Having prickles or thorns.

Origin

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₂er- Proto-Indo-European *h₂érmos Proto-Germanic *armaz Proto-West Germanic *arm Old English earm Middle English arm English arm English -ed English armed From arm (“to equip with a weapon”) + -ed.

Forms

more armed most armed

Derived

armed and dangerous armed bullhead armed conflict armed forces armed merchantman armedness armed neutrality armed police armed probe armed rebellion armed response armed revolt armed robbery armed secession armed struggle armed to the teeth biarmed busy as a one-armed paperhanger multiarmed nonarmed nuclear-armed triarmed unarmed

Adjective in compounds, not comparable

  1. Having an arm or arms, often of a specified number or type.

    Antonyms: armless

    Coordinate Terms: legged

  2. Possessing arms of a specified number or type.
    • the four-armed creature
    • the strong-armed man
    • His shoulders broad and strong, / Armed long and round. - 1613–1614 (date written), John Fletcher, William Shak[e]speare, The Two Noble Kinsmen: […], London: […] Tho[mas] Cotes, for Iohn Waterson; […], published 1634,...

    Antonyms: armless

  3. Having horns, claws, teeth, a beak, etc. in a particular tincture, as contrasted with that of the animal as a whole.

Origin

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₂er- Proto-Indo-European *h₂érmos Proto-Germanic *armaz Proto-West Germanic *arm Old English earm Middle English arm English arm English -ed English armed From arm (“the upper limb of the body”) + -ed.

Derived

cross-armed long-armed squid multi-armed multi-armed bandit one-armed one-armed bandit open-armed tri-armed two-armed

Verb

  1. simple past and past participle of arm