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Glite Dictionary
⚔️ Civil War battle 🌊 A Virginia stream
Bull Run

Bull Run

6.9
A creek in northeastern Virginia where two Civil War battles took place
  • proper noun
  • /bʊl rʌn/
  • US
translation icon : Bull Run
  • I don't know what he said after Bull Run or after Antietam or after Spotsylvania if he survived.

Examples

  • When my teacher said "Manassas," I told her it should be called "Bull Run," that there was a first and second Bull Run, and only Yankees called it Manassas.

    Academic text (1991)

  • The First Battle of Bull Run marked a significant early conflict in the American Civil War.

  • Many historians view Bull Run as a turning point in the strategies used by both Union and Confederate forces.

  • During the Second Battle of Bull Run, the Confederate army decisively defeated the Union troops.

Surface Forms

Bull Run main

Morphology

Bull + run

The components 'Bull' + 'run' (with 'run' = small stream) transparently suggest a place-name for a stream, so a B1 learner would likely infer it denotes a geographic feature. However, the MWE refers specifically to historical battles named after that place, which is a conventional, encyclopedic meaning not predictable from the constituents alone, so the overall expression is only partially transparent.

Etymology

Bull Run may come from a simple image: long ago people saw bulls running through or crossing a small stream, so the creek became known as 'Bull Run'.