combat

Borrowed from French, from Old French combatre, from Vulgar Latin *combattere, from Latin com- (“with”) + battuere (“to beat, strike”).

• Noun:
  • (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈkɒmˌbæt/
  • (US) IPA^(key): /ˈkɑmˌbæt/

  • Audio (US)

    (file)

• Verb:
  • (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈkɒmˌbæt/
  • (US) IPA^(key): /kəmˈbæt/, /ˈkɑmˌbæt/

  • Audio (US)

    (file)

• Rhymes: -æt

combat (countable and uncountable, plural combats)

1. A battle, a fight (often one in which weapons are used); a struggle for victory.
   • 1907, Robert William Chambers, chapter VIII, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, OCLC 24962326:

     "My tastes," he said, still smiling, "incline me to the garishly sunlit side of this planet." And, to tease her and arouse her to combat: "I prefer a farandole to a nocturne; I'd rather have a painting than an etching; Mr. Whistler bores me with his monochromatic mud; I don't like dull colours, dull sounds, dull intellects; […]."

   • 2012 March 1, William E. Carter, Merri Sue Carter, “The British Longitude Act Reconsidered”, in American Scientist, volume 100, number 2, page 87:

     Conditions were horrendous aboard most British naval vessels at the time. Scurvy and other diseases ran rampant, killing more seamen each year than all other causes combined, including combat.

• combat pay
• combative
• stage combat

combat (third-person singular simple present combats, present participle combatting or combating, simple past and past participle combatted or combated)

1. (transitive) To fight; to struggle against.

   It has proven very difficult to combat drug addiction.

2. (intransitive) To fight (with); to struggle for victory (against).
   • (Can we date this quote by John Milton?)

     To combat with a blind man I disdain.

• tombac

• (Balearic, Valencian) IPA^(key): /komˈbat/
• (Central) IPA^(key): /kumˈbat/
• Rhymes: -at

combat m (plural combats)

1. combat

combat

1. third-person singular present indicative form of combatre
2. second-person singular imperative form of combatre

From combattre.

• IPA^(key): /kɔ̃.ba/

• Audio

  (file)

• Homophone: combats

combat m (plural combats)

1. combat (hostile interaction)
2. (figuratively) combat (contest; competition)
3. (in the plural) battle; military combat

combat

1. third-person singular present indicative of combattre

• “combat” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

combat m (plural combats)

1. (Jersey) combat