stoccado

[ stuh-kah-doh ]

noun

, Archaic.

, plural stoc·ca·dos.

1. a thrust with a rapier or other pointed weapon.

Word History and Origins

Origin of stoccado¹

1575–85; alteration of Italian stoccata, equivalent to stocc ( o ) swordpoint, dagger (< Germanic; compare Old English stocc stake) + -ata -ade ¹; -ado < Spanish, as in renegado

Example Sentences

He is as you say a stout man and a resolute swordsman, though from what I have seen of his play he is weak in stoccado, and perhaps somewhat too much attached to the edge, and doth not give prominence enough to the point, in which respect he neglects the advice and teaching of the most noteworthy fencers in Europe.

From Project Gutenberg

M. de Loubois gave orders to build a terrace-fort, far preferable to a stoccado; there he left M. du Crenet, with an hundred and twenty men in garrison, with cannon and ammunition; after which he went down the Missisippi to New Orleans.

From Project Gutenberg

By the life of Pharaoh, an't were my case now, I should send him a challenge presently: the bastinado! come hither, you shall challenge him; I'll shew you a trick or two, you shall kill him at pleasure, the first stoccado if you will, by this air.

From Project Gutenberg

Fie! venue, most gross denomination as ever I heard: oh, the stoccado while you live, Signior, not that.

From Project Gutenberg

And so, as the shades of dusk thicken in that Bois-de-Boulogne, we behold two men with lion-look, with alert attitude, side foremost, right foot advanced; flourishing and thrusting, stoccado and passado, in tierce and quart; intent to skewer one another.

From Project Gutenberg