[Idiom] Phrases related to firearms and the like?

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CrabbyAmerikan

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Greetings!-
My wife thinks I think too much, and she may well be right. Nevertheless, I've been wondering lately about the unique idioms and such associated with firearms, and the origins of this stuff. Things like 'open fire', and the more abstract ones. We have so bloody many of these things in English, and sometimes one, or a group of them, seems to get stuck in the 'ol noggin, yes?
So, I wonder if someone might be able to point me to where someone's gone into these things.
Then too, I wonder why a man with a gun is a gunman, but if he has a bat he's not frequently referred to as a batman, or one with a knife a knifeman? Why so bloody many times shots 'ring out'. Sometimes I just want to throttle the next person whose shots ring out. Grrr.
I hope this is the proper place for the ramblings of an old(er) crab, but one has to start someplace, yes?
Peace.
-CrabbyAmerikan
 

SlickVic9000

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(Not a Teacher)

Here are some other idioms that come to mind:

We spotted them first and lit them up.
He crossed a couple of mobsters and got ventilated.
She was capped twice in the back of the head.
Helicopters raked the village with gunfire.
I sniped him off the guard tower.
We went in guns hot.
We're under fire!
They smoked him in front of a nearby bookstore.
I tagged him in the chest with my revolver.
We sent some rounds downrange for an hour or two.
He was shot down during the ensuing firefight.
He said the wrong thing and was gunned down then and there.
My pistol stovepiped at an inopportune moment.
This gun's got some mean kick.
 
J

J&K Tutoring

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Vic- I think Mr. C is looking for the origins of these idioms, not just a collection.

I imagine there are different origins for different idioms. Many of them use the word fire, probably because the earliest firearms used actual fire to ignite the powder charge and the reference stuck through the various developments in the technology.

As to the overuse of the phrase 'a shot rang out', personally, I blame Snoopy...:-D
 

bhaisahab

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A couple of other idioms associated with firearms: "A flash in the pan", "Going off at half cock"
 
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