gat
gat Lexical Profile
gat Game Scores & Validity
• noun
North American (slang) A pistol, revolver, or other firearm.
"In classic 1930s detective novels, the hard-boiled private investigator often refers to a concealed handgun as a gat."
A natural or artificial narrow channel, strait, or passage of water between sandbanks, cliffs, or islands, especially along the coasts of northwestern Europe.
"The fishing vessel navigated carefully through the narrow gat between the shifting coastal sandbanks."
• Rhymes for gat
Word Origin & Etymology
In its slang sense meaning 'gun', it is an early 20th-century clipping of 'Gatling gun', named after the American inventor Richard Jordan Gatling. In its geographical sense meaning a channel or strait, it derives from Middle Dutch or Old Norse 'gat', meaning 'opening' or 'passage' (cognate with English 'gate').
Usage Trend
Historical frequency of usage in published text.