Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Spearhead |
SpearheadNoun1. Someone who leads or initiates an activity (attack or campaign etc.). 2. The leading military unit in an attack. 3. The head and sharpened point of a spear. Verb1. Be the leader of; "She spearheded the effort to find a cure for the disease". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "spearhead" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1839. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Mining | A. The point of convergence of two cross faces set off in the form of the letter V b. A conical head on a wire-line core barrel, engaged by the dogs on the overshot assembly for the purpose of removing the inner tube of the corebarrel from a borehole. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
Synonym: SpearheadSynonym: spearpoint (n). (additional references) |
Crosswords: Spearhead |
| English words defined with "spearhead": hastate leaf ♦ pike. (references) |
| Non-English Usage: "Spearhead" is also a word in the following language with the English translation in parentheses. Portuguese (spearhead). |
| Domain | Usage | |
Movie/TV Titles | Spearhead (1978) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title |
References | |
Books | |
Theater & Movies | |
High Tech |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Title | Author | Quote |
Grapes of Wrath | Steinbeck, John | The wild oat head fell out and three of the spearhead seeds stuck in the ground. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Business | The growth rate of the franchising sector in Chile is projected at 10 percent for the year 2000. Chile is not only a growing market in itself, but is also a spearhead in expanding to the rest of the Latin American market. (references) | |
Economic History | Mauritius | The Prime Minister is chairing a Ministerial Committee to spearhead the development of ICT in Mauritius. (references) |
Malaysia | The Multimedia Development Corporation (MDC) was formed to spearhead the development of the MSC as part of the Government's Vision 2020 agenda. (references) | |
Singapore | The Health Promotion Board will provide the framework for greater focus on major health problems and spearhead health education, promotion and preventive programs. (references) | |
Worker Rights | Zimbabwe | Most observers noted that the ZFTU was reformed by ZANU-PF to spearhead its campaign to force mostly white-owned businesses to resolve individual wage and employment disputes and grant higher wages to their workers. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| Speaker | Term | Phrase(s) |
Lyndon B. Johnson | 1963-1969 | So a Department of Housing and Urban Development will be needed to spearhead this effort in our cities. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| "Spearhead" is generally used as a lexical verb (infinitive) -- approximately 42.42% of the time. "Spearhead" is used about 99 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Lexical Verb (infinitive) | 42.42% | 42 | 52,864 |
| Noun (singular) | 34.34% | 34 | 59,261 |
| Lexical Verb (base form) | 23.23% | 23 | 72,767 |
| Total | 100.00% | 99 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
| Country | Name |
| South Africa | Spearhead Property Holdings Limited |
| (more examples...) |
Source: compiled by the editor from Icon Group International, Inc.
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "spearhead": spearhead-shaped. | |
Ending with "spearhead": twin-spearhead. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Language | Translations for "spearhead"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Albanian | majë shtize. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Arabic | كان في المقدمة, تقدم كرأس الحربة, السنان نصل الرمح, رأس الحربة. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bulgarian | човек повеждащ атака, част повеждаща атака, острие на копие, авангард (advance guard, avant garde, vanguard). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Chinese | 矛 (an attack or criticism, barb), 矛头. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Czech | vést (administer, captain, carry on, channel, conduce, conduct, convey, direct, give, go, head, keep, lead, look, run, Shepherd, steer, stock, supervise, throw, wage, walk, wheel), být v èele (head), èelní oddíl, špièka (dig, end, innuendo, nib, peak, rush, taunt, tip, top). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Danish | væske uden sand. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Dutch | speerpunt, initiator (initiator). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Farsi | پیشگامی کردن , هرچیزنوک تیز (Pike), نوک نیزه (Pike), رهبری کردن (Conduce, Head, Lead, Pilot). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Finnish | kärkineste. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
French | fluide sans sable, fer de lance, être le fer de lance, être la tête de. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
German | Stoßkeil (speared), speerspitze. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Greek | αιχμή δόρατοσ (spear head). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hebrew | כתת חו", כוח מחץ (impact, striking force), ראש מחץ, ראש חץ (wedge). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hungarian | lándzsahegy, dárdahegy. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Italian | spearhead, punta di lancia, essere alla testa di, avanguardia (avant garde, forefront, Van, vanguard). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Japanese Kanji | 先端 (advanced, cusp, fine point, leading edge, pointed end, tip, vanguard). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Japanese Katakana | さいぜ"せ" (first line, foremost line, front), せ"た" (advanced, cusp, fine point, leading edge, opening of hostilities, pointed end, sorting of coal, the elixir, tip, vanguard), やりさき, やりのほさき. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Korean | 기간장식. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Manx | kione soiaghee, kione sleeaney. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pig Latin | earheadspay spearhead, ponta de lança. (various references) острие (edge, nib, prick, spearheads, tine). (various references) vrh koplja, prvi talas, čelo kolone. (various references) punta de lanza. (various references) spjutspets, vätska utan sand, gå i spetsen, förtrupp (advance guard, van, vanguard). (various references) ผู้นำหน้า, หัวหอก. (various references) mızrak ucu, başı çekmek (head), öncülük etmek (blaze the trail, guide, lead, pioneer), öncü asker, öncü (advance, advance guard, advanced, apostle, avant garde, bannerbearer, high priest, initiator, pilot, pioneer, pole star, precursor, trailblazer, vanguard), önayak olmak (begin, initiate, lead the way, pioneer, promote, take the initiative, take the lead). (various references) вістря (barb, edge, nib, peak, pile, prick, spire), передовий загін. (various references) tổ xung kích, mũi nhọn (gad), mũi mác tổ mũi nhọn, mũi giáo. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Anglo-French | 1100-1600 | soket. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "spearhead": spearheaded, spearheading, spearheads. (additional references) | |
| |
"Spearhead" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: spearheded. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "spearhead" (pronounced spi"rhe'd) |
| 4 | -r h e' d | Airhead, warhead. |
| 3 | -h e' d | arrowhead, beachhead, bridgehead, bulkhead, bullhead, copperhead, Deadhead, dragonhead, drumhead, egghead, figurehead, flathead, Godhead, hardhead, letterhead, Loggerhead, masthead, redhead, skinhead, steelhead, thickhead, trailhead, wellhead, Whitehead. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-a-d-e-e-h-p-r-s" | |
-1 letter: ephedras, reshaped. | |
-2 letters: adheres, ephedra, headers, hearsed, parades, pardahs, phrased, reshape, respade, saphead, sharped, sheared, speared, sphered. | |
-3 letters: adhere, dasher, drapes, erased, haeres, harped, hasped, header, heaped, hearse, heders, herpes, padres, parade, pardah, pardee, parsed, pashed, pesade, phased, phrase, raphae, raphes, rasped, reaped, reseda, sarape, seared, serape, seraph, shader, shaped, shaper, shared, sherpa. | |
-4 letters: aahed. | |
-5 letters: aahs. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-a-d-e-e-h-p-r-s" | |
+1 letter: spearheads. | |
+2 letters: spearheaded. | |
+3 letters: paraldehydes, spearheading. | |
+5 letters: headmastership, pseudepigrapha, radiotherapies. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Slideshow 7. Quotations: Fiction 8. Quotations: Non-fiction | 9. Quotations: Speeches 10. Usage Frequency 11. Names: Company Usage 12. Expressions | 13. Expressions: Internet 14. Translations: Modern 15. Translations: Ancient 16. Derivations | 17. Rhymes 18. Anagrams 19. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
