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In the early era of firearms, cannons of lesser size such as the falconet were sometimes named for birds of prey. Following this pattern, Italians applied moschetto or moschetta, meaning "sparrow hawk," to a small-caliber piece of ordnance in the 16th century. Spaniards borrowed this word as mosquete, and the French as mosquet, but both applied it to a heavy shoulder firearm rather than a cannon; English musket was borrowed soon thereafter from French. The word musket was retained after the original matchlock firing mechanism was replaced by a wheel lock, and retained still after the wheel lock was replaced by the flintlock. As the practice of rifling firearms—incising the barrel with spiral grooves to improve the bullet's accuracy—became more common, the term musket gradually gave way to the newer word rifle in the 18th century.
Examples of musket in a Sentence
Miami Herald Archives, Miami Herald, 6 Apr. 2026
The cannonball joins over 250,000 artifacts found at the site, the expert added, which mostly include ceramic pieces, musket balls, adobe floor fragments and glass bottles.
—Andrea Margolis, FOXNews.com, 3 Apr. 2026
Their armaments included a variety of cannons, bombs made of explosive shells, and muskets.
—Encyclopedia Britannica, 2 Apr. 2026
He was killed during the French siege of Maastricht in the Franco-Dutch War on June 25, 1673, after being struck in the throat by a musket ball.
—Reuters, NBC news, 26 Mar. 2026
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Cite this Entry
“Musket.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/musket. Accessed 8 Apr. 2026.
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musket
noun
