quarter-staff

A form of quarterstaff — A wooden staff with an approximate length between 2 and 2.5 meters, sometimes tipped with iron, used as a weapon in rural England during the Early Modern period.

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Meanings

nounquarter-staff (plural quarter-staffs or quarter-staves)

plural quarter-staffs · plural quarter-staves

  1. alternativeAlternative form of quarterstaff.

    [F]ew country people there are who do not love to see two sturdy fellows thwack and belabour each other with quarter-staff, single-stick, or fists.

    1881, Walter Besant, James Rice, “How Kitty First Saw the Doctor”, in The Chaplain of the Fleet […], volume I, London: Chatto and Windus, […], →OCLC, part I (Within the Rules), page 82
Cite this entry
APA

quarter-staff. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/quarter-staff

MLA

“quarter-staff.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/quarter-staff. Accessed November 4, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “quarter-staff,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/quarter-staff.

Source: quarter-staff on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.