Etymology

crossfire

cross·fire
C3R1O1S1S1F4I1R1E1

Today it means: An arrangement of two or more weapons so each can fire diagonally at something in front of a line between them. Full definition →

English fire ← Middle English fyr ← Old English fȳr
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. Englishcross-
  2. Proto-Indo-European*péh₂wr̥
  3. Proto-Germanic*fōr
  4. Proto-West Germanic*fuir
  5. Old Englishfȳr
  6. Middle Englishfyr
  7. Englishfire
  8. English todaycrossfire

From cross- + fire.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.