water pistol
4
1.3
- noun
- /ˈwɔːtər ˈpɪstl/
:
pistola de agua
- He filled his water pistol with water and aimed it at his friends for some fun.
- squirt a water pistol
- shoot a water pistol
And they used the ends of water pistols.
- And they used the ends of water pistols.
Examples
-
John sees two kids playing with machine-gun water pistols nearby, viciously squirting each other.
Fiction book (1991) -
Why does your partner carry a water pistol?
-
My water pistols are better than yours.
Blog text (21) -
And always, there's a little boy, 9 years old, with a water pistol!
-
Okay, all right, I've got some water pistols in the car.
-
He placed the water pistol on his lap and sat back.
Fiction book (2001) -
Stan Tobias wants a Power Pumper water pistol.
-
The children splashed each other with their water pistols during the hot summer day.
-
At the birthday party, each kid received a water pistol as part of the party favors.
Synonyms
9
1.0
A toy that sprays water for children to play with
7
2.1
A toy that shoots a small stream of water
5
1.9
A small toy that shoots a thin stream of water
How Powerful
Surface Forms
Morphology
water + pistol
The meaning is directly derivable from combining 'water' (the liquid) with 'pistol' (a small gun) to indicate a gun-like toy that shoots water; this is a straightforward substance+instrument noun compound. Such noun-noun compounding is a regular, cross-linguistic pattern in English, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents would readily understand the MWE.
Etymology
Water pistol is a simple, literal name for a small pistol that shoots water instead of bullets when children play. So it means 'a toy gun that shoots out a stream of water'.