an implement with a shaft and barbed point used for catching fish
<noun.artifact>
a surgical knife with a pointed double-edged blade; used for punctures and small incisions
<noun.artifact> [ verb ]
move quickly, as if by cutting one's way
<verb.motion> Planes lanced towards the shore
pierce with a lance, as in a knights' fight
<verb.contact>
open by piercing with a lancet
<verb.contact> lance a boil
Lance \Lance\ (l[a^]ns), n. [OE. lance, F. lance, fr. L. lancea; cf. Gr. lo`gchh. Cf. {Launch}.] 1. A weapon of war, consisting of a long shaft or handle and a steel blade or head; a spear carried by horsemen, and often decorated with a small flag; also, a spear or harpoon used by whalers and fishermen.
A braver soldier never couched lance. --Shak.
2. A soldier armed with a lance; a lancer.
3. (Founding) A small iron rod which suspends the core of the mold in casting a shell.
4. (Mil.) An instrument which conveys the charge of a piece of ordnance and forces it home.
5. (Pyrotech.) One of the small paper cases filled with combustible composition, which mark the outlines of a figure.
6. (Med.) A lancet. [PJC]
{Free lance}, in the Middle Ages, and subsequently, a knight or roving soldier, who was free to engage for any state or commander that purchased his services; hence, a person who assails institutions or opinions on his own responsibility without regard to party lines or deference to authority. See also {freelance}, n. and a., and {freelancer}.
{Lance bucket} (Cavalry), a socket attached to a saddle or stirrup strap, in which to rest the but of a lance.
{Lance corporal}, same as {Lancepesade}.
{Lance knight}, a lansquenet. --B. Jonson.
{Lance snake} (Zo["o]l.), the fer-de-lance.
{Stink-fire lance} (Mil.), a kind of fuse filled with a composition which burns with a suffocating odor; -- used in the counter operations of miners.
{To break a lance}, to engage in a tilt or contest.
Lance \Lance\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Lanced}; p. pr. & vb. n. {Lancing}.] 1. To pierce with a lance, or with any similar weapon.
Seized the due victim, and with fury lanced Her back. --Dryden.
2. To open with a lancet; to pierce; as, to lance a vein or an abscess.
3. To throw in the manner of a lance. See {Lanch}.
His scourged, tortured crucified body; his head wounded by the thorns; his side pierced by the lance.
Here is a lance that should deflate some intellectual pride: "All my life I have been interested in how people think.
Friends identified him as Alan Johnston, a carpenter and lance corporal in the Ulster Defense Regiment, a locally recruited, mainly Protestant organization.
As part of the discharge he is being reduced in rank from corporal to lance corporal.
The tiny sand lance, a pencil-thin fish preferred by several species of whales, is being noticed in dense concentrations in the Stellwagen area, say experts.
He had been a free lance since 1954, writing for The New York Times, Harper's, the Atlantic, The Washington Post and other publications.
A Henderson, N.C., native and graduate of Duke University and its law school, he was practicing law and doing free lance TV work when he met TV journalist Bill Moyers in 1974.
WASHINGTON _ Former television evangelist Pat Robertson insists he's not one for "tilting at windmills," but his refusal to lay down his lance formally is posing a few tactical problems for Vice President George Bush.
The five-paragraph release had seven punctuation or spelling errors, spelled the term "free lance" three different ways, and assured me that "These aren't prima donna's."
"Very smooth," the count notes in his book, as the cow charges the picador's horse and buries its horns in its side despite the jabbing of the lance.
"Who do you think is going to be in the Super Bowl this year, sir?" the lance corporal asked.