Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A plug or cover for the muzzle of a cannon or gun to keep out dust and moisture.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A stopper; a plug; a bung.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A wooden stopper, or plug, as for a cannon or other piece of ordnance, when not in use.
  • noun (Mus.) A plug for upper end of an organ pipe.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A wooden plug, or a metal or canvas cover for the muzzle of a gun, a cannon or other piece of ordnance when not in use; a stopper; a bung.
  • noun music A plug for the upper end of an organ pipe.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun plug for the muzzle of a gun to keep out dust and moisture

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old French tampon, variant of tapon, rag for stopping a hole, of Germanic origin.]

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Examples

  • Re the applicator issue, see also the French 'tampion' - a stopper for the barrel of a gun or cannon; but probably not Tampere which is known as Finland's Manchester ... although now I come to think of it ...

    Word Magazine - Comments 2009

  • A dome covering the bore may prove to be a tampion, a plug used to seal the gun when not in use.

    Reclaiming the Bounty 1999

  • Hornblower took out the tampion and went round to the breech; he twirled the elevating screw until his eye told him that the gun was at the maximum elevation at which it could be run out.

    Flying Colours Forester, C. S. 1938

  • A tampion, or wad, of oakum or the like, was rammed down between the cartridge and the ball, and a second wad kept the ball in place.

    On the Spanish Main Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. John Masefield 1922

  • He took the tarpaulin from the breech and the tampion from the muzzle, cast off the lashings which secured it, and saw that the swivel moved freely in the socket and the trunnions freely in the crotch.

    Mr. Midshipman Easy Marryat, Frederick, 1792-1848 1873

  • _Thampion (tampon_, Fr., a bung, cork, or plug of wood) is now written _tampion_, and signifies the stopper with which the mouths of cannon are closed up, to prevent the admission of rain, or sea water, whereby their charges might be rendered incapable of service.

    A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 1 William Carew Hazlitt 1873

  • But when this tampion at this [505] castle did light,

    A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 1 William Carew Hazlitt 1873

  • Our antiquary writes like one unacquainted with his subject; no man, I believe, ever talked _of charging_ a gun with a _tampion_; neither would the said _tampion_ (consisting of a piece of hard oak) have done much less mischief than a stone, if pointed from the Thames at the Queen's

    A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 1 William Carew Hazlitt 1873

  • [Tamkin, or tampion, the wooden stopper of a cannon placed in the muzzle to exclude water or dust.] in his guns.

    Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete Samuel Pepys 1668

  • [Tamkin, or tampion, the wooden stopper of a cannon placed in the muzzle to exclude water or dust.] in his guns.

    Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete 1667 N.S. Samuel Pepys 1668

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