knifeplay

K5N1I1F4E1P3L1A1Y4
US/ˈnaɪf(ˌ)pleɪ/

noun

The act of fighting or cutting with a knife.

Scrabble 21
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Meanings

nounknifeplay (uncountable)
  1. uncountableThe act of fighting or cutting with a knife.

    Reinhart had finished his neat knifeplay, having transformed a half-pound of slab bacon into an accumulation of little strips measuring half an inch by an inch and a half.

    1981, Thomas Berger, Reinhart's Women, Open Road, published 2013, →ISBN
    2 more examples

    "Can't either of you think? If we have to fight I want you to blary win. For that you need training and practice. Swordplay, knifeplay, bare-knuckle, staves. Archery. Trickery. Everything."

    2009, Robert V. S. Redick, The Ruling Sea, Del Ray, published 2011, →ISBN, page 138

    After a tense confrontation that almost lead to knifeplay, Lawrence recounted, "Mohammed Said and Abd el Kader then went away, breaking vengeance against me as a Christian."

    2013, Scott Anderson, Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East, Knopf, →ISBN
  2. uncountableBDSMA sexual practice involving the use of knives, daggers, or swords for physical and mental stimulation.

    Partly because I loved milder forms of knifeplay but had never taken it as far as I'd fantasized, but mostly because of her.

    2014, D. L. King, She Who Must Be Obeyed, Lethe Press, →ISBN, page 106
    2 more examples

    When the professor turned out to be too warped even for my tastes — consensual knifeplay is one thing; drunken gunplay quite another […]

    2009, Quince Mountain, “Cowboy for Christ”, in Jeff Sharlet, Peter Manseau, editors, Believer, Beware: First-Person Dispatches from the Margins of Faith, Beacon Press, →ISBN, page 116

    Michael's knifeplay had never aroused him, but that fact had never concerned Jonathan, for Michael had never insisted upon it.

    2009, Erastes, Transgressions, Running Press, →ISBN, page 318

Origin

From knife + play.

Full word history & related roots →

Translations

Finnish puukkotappelu, puukkohippaset
  • puukkotappeluact of fighting or cutting with a knife
  • puukkohippasetact of fighting or cutting with a knife
Cite this entry
APA

knifeplay. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/knifeplay

MLA

“knifeplay.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/knifeplay. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “knifeplay,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/knifeplay.

Source: knifeplay on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.