Also 6 iavelyn(e, -ynge, -inge, -en, Sc. ievilling, (geweling, iaivelin), 6–7 iaveling, -ine, 7 javlin. [a. F. javeline (15th c. in Hatz.-Darm.); from the radical javel-, found also in JAVELOT.]
1. A light spear thrown with the hand with or without the help of a thong; a dart.
1513. [see javelin spear in 4].
1530. Palsgr., 233/2. Iavelyn a speare, jauelot.
1535. Coverdale, 1 Sam. xix. 10. Saul … had a iauelynge in his hande…. And Saul thought with the iauelinge to sticke Dauid first to the wall.
1592. Shaks., Ven. & Ad., 616 (Globe). With javelin’s point a churlish swine to gore.
1667. Milton, P. L., XI. 658. Others from the Wall defend With Dart and Jav’lin.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1776), III. 227. When the hunters approach him [the lion], they either shoot or throw their javelins.
1874. Boutell, Arms & Arm., i. 2. The arrow—either discharged from the bow or thrown as a javelin from the hand.
b. Her. A charge consisting of a short spear with a barbed head.
1882. Cussans, Handbk. Her., vii. (ed. 3), 122. When a plain Spear is intended, it must be blazoned as a Javelin.
† c. As rendering of L. jaculus, a serpent that darts on its prey; cf. DART sb. 4. Obs. rare–1.
1718. Rowe, trans. Lucan, IX. Fierce from afar a darting javelin shot, For such, the serpent’s name has Afric taught.
d. fig.
1850. Mrs. Browning, An Island, v. Where the grey rocks strike Their javelins up the azure.
1856. Susan Warner, Hills of Shatemuc, xxiii. 246. The speaker was a well dressed and easy mannered man of the world; but with a very javelin of an eye.
1867. Whittier, Tent on Beach, 197. Piercing the waves along its track With the slant javelins of rain.
† 2. A pointed weapon with a long shaft used for thrusting; a pike or half-pike; a lance. Obs.
1520. Rutland Papers (Camden), 43. And lx of his [the king’s] gard on horsbacke, with javelyns.
a. 1548. Hall, Chron., Hen. VIII., 235 b. Every man havyng a iavelyn or slaughsword to keepe the people in aray.
1576. Extracts Aberdeen Reg. (1848), II. 27. Ane halberd, dence aiks, or geweling.
1656. Blount, Glossogr., Javeline, a weapon of a size between the Pike and Partisan.
a. 1839. Praed, Poems (1864), II. 422. And see thy javelin’s point be bright, Thy falchion’s temper true.
b. One who bears a ‘javelin’; = JAVELIN-MAN 1.
1849. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., iii. I. 338. There were the halls where the judges, robed in scarlet and escorted by javelins and trumpets, opened the king’s commission twice a year.
† 3. A fish: app. the pilchard or anchovy (both caught in immense numbers at Venice, and preserved for exportation). Obs. rare.
1655. Moufet & Bennet, Health’s Improv. (1746), 244. Javelings or Sea-darts are plentiful in the Venetian Gulf, and all the Adriatic Sea.
4. attrib. and Comb., as javelin-bearer, -head, -spear: javelin-darting, -proof adjs.; javelin-bat, a South American vampire, Phyllostoma hastatum; javelin-fish, a species of hæmulonid fish (Pomodasys hasta) (Funk); javelin-snake, a snake-like lizard of the genus Acontias = dart-snake (DART sb. 4, 8); also applied to various species of Bothrops, an American genus of Crotalidæ or rattlesnakes.
1861. Hulme, trans. Moquin-Tandon, II. IV. i. 212. It has been asserted that … the Vampire and the *Javelin Bat … could destroy a man by sucking his blood.
1552. Huloet, *Iauelyn bearer, lancearius.
1813. Byron, Br. Abydos, I. ix. Nor mark’d the *javelin-darting crowd.
1552. Huloet, *Iauelyn head, sicilites.
1866. Conington, Æneid, II. 664. Screened by a pent house *javelin-proof.
1835. Penny Cycl., IV. 529/1. These bones are absent in the fourth subgenus, Acontias (*Javelin-Snake) of Cuvier.
1847. Carpenter, Zool., § 502. The Acontias, or Javelin Snake, of Southern Africa, is nearly allied to our Slow-worm.
1861. Hulme, trans. Moquin-Tandon, II. V. i. 257. The most formidable species is the Javelin Snake properly so called, or Yellow Viper of Martinique (Bothrops Lanceolatus).
1513. Douglas, Æneis, XII. iv. 14. The braid hed brangland on the *ievilling speyr.
