knife fight
9
7.4
- noun
- /naɪf faɪt/
- NSFW
:
pelea con cuchillos
- If this is a knife fight, sir, right now we're fighting it alone.
- get into a knife fight
- knife fight broke
- result of a knife fight
When you're dealing with a human being and you're in a knife fight, that's a matter of skill with that knife and knowing what you're doing with it.
- When you're dealing with a human being and you're in a knife fight, that's a matter of skill with that knife and knowing what you're doing with it.
- And there would be knife fights or burning type experiences or just things that would cause me to hide under a table until my dad would come home.
- And I noticed that something about me is sometimes in prison to be a knife fight and people just you see them rough guys that turn white from it.
Examples
-
Above his left eye was a scar from a knife fight in a pub.
Fiction book (1991) -
I wouldn't have wanted to be in a knife fight with him, that's for sure.
Blog text (2) -
Wanna know how to win a knife fight?
-
Never bring a gun to a knife fight!
-
I got cut up in a knife fight.
-
After he found the woman and her husband at a nearby bar, a knife fight broke out.
Academic text (1993) -
Another time, a knife fight broke out between two of the men and resulted in the death of one of them.
Fiction book (1993) -
Anyone who has been involved in a knife fight will be inadmissible under the new law.
Academic text (2002) -
We can't afford to have this knife fight go on any longer.
-
He suffered serious injuries during a knife fight in the alley.
Synonyms
1
9.9
A fight with knives
Antonyms
How Violent
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a violent fight involving knives' is directly and transparently derived from the literal combination of 'knife' (a cutting weapon) and 'fight' (a physical clash). This noun-noun composition is a straightforward, cross-linguistically common way to specify the instrument of a fight, so a B1 learner who knows both words would readily understand it.
Etymology
Knife fight comes from a literal picture: people fighting with a knife or knives. The words knife and fight name the action, so the phrase means 'a dangerous fight where people use knives'.