flanker

plural flankers

1. ball gamesA player who plays in the back row of the scrum.
2. American footballA wide receiver who lines up behind the line of scrimmage.
3. governmentA fortification or soldier projecting so as to defend another work or to command the flank of an assailing body.

   [The planters’ houses] were frequently constructed with flankers and loopholes, for the purpose of firing upon the assailants when they approached so near.

   1803, Robert Charles Dallas, The History of the Maroons, London: Longman and Rees, Volume 1, Letter 2, p. 27

   2 more examples

   1675, The Captivity of Mary Rowlandson, from The Portable Native American Indian Reader, New York: Penguin Books, 1977, page 312, About two hours...they had been about the house before they prevailed to fire it (which they did with Flax and Hemp, which they brought out of the Barn, and there being no defence about the House, only two Flankers at two opposite corners and one of them not finished) they fired it once and one ventured out and quenched it, but they quickly fired it again, and that took.

   It was in vain they threw out flankers, and endeavored to dislodge their assailants; each pause gave time for other pursuers to come within reach, and open attacks from different quarters.

   1855, Washington Irving, chapter 37, in The Life of George Washington, volume 1, New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, page 278

4. archaeologyOne of a pair of large upright monoliths erected on either end of the recumbent, in recumbent stone circles of Aberdeenshire, Scotland, and the counties of Cork and Kerry in south-west of Ireland.
5. businessA usually lower-end brand or product introduced in order to target competitors and protect a company's main market share.

   Synonyms: fighter, flanker brand, fighter brand

6. perfumeryNewly created perfume that shares some attributes of an already existing perfume.

present singular third person flankers · participle present flankering · participle past flankered · past flankered

1. obsoleteTo defend by lateral fortifications.

   the Castle was neither ſo weakly mann'd nor flanker'd as they were made belive

   1634, T[homas] H[erbert], A Relation of Some Yeares Trauaile, Begunne Anno 1626. into Afrique and the Greater Asia, […], London: […] William Stansby, and Jacob Bloome, →OCLC

2. obsoleteTo attack sideways.

   1 more example

   1670, John Evelyn, Sylva or, A Discourse of Forest-Trees, and the Propagation of Timber in His Majesties Dominions, London, Chapter 3, “Of the Oak,” p. 19, […] to my observation in our Climates, where those sharp winds do rather flanker than blow fully opposite upon our Plantations, they thrive best […]