"son of a gun" meaning in English

See son of a gun in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Interjection

Etymology: Euphemistic variant of son of a bitch. There are folk etymologies suggesting nautical origins, such as a reference to the disputed parentage of a child born aboard a ship (between the guns), or a child fathered by a soldier (also referred to as a "gun"). However, these etymologies are not supported by evidence. Etymology templates: {{m|en|son of a bitch}} son of a bitch, {{glossary|folk etymology|folk etymologies}} folk etymologies Head templates: {{head|en|interjection}} son of a gun
  1. (euphemistic) Used to express anger, contempt, disgust, astonishment, disappointment, etc. Tags: euphemistic Categories (topical): People Translations (euphemism): اِبْنُ الفَاعِلَةِ (ibnu l-fāʕilati) [masculine] (Arabic), ça alors (French), skurczybyk (Polish), ку́рицын сын (kúricyn syn) [masculine] (Russian)
    Sense id: en-son_of_a_gun-en-intj-V9sa3NPb Disambiguation of People: 46 2 52 Categories (other): English euphemisms

Noun

Forms: sons of guns [plural]
Etymology: Euphemistic variant of son of a bitch. There are folk etymologies suggesting nautical origins, such as a reference to the disputed parentage of a child born aboard a ship (between the guns), or a child fathered by a soldier (also referred to as a "gun"). However, these etymologies are not supported by evidence. Etymology templates: {{m|en|son of a bitch}} son of a bitch, {{glossary|folk etymology|folk etymologies}} folk etymologies Head templates: {{en-noun|sons of guns}} son of a gun (plural sons of guns)
  1. (euphemistic) son of a bitch Tags: euphemistic Categories (topical): English minced oaths Derived forms: I'll be a son of a gun, son-of-a-gun stew
    Sense id: en-son_of_a_gun-en-noun-8LB-MO05 Disambiguation of English minced oaths: 17 59 24 Categories (other): English euphemisms, English entries with incorrect language header, English entries with language name categories using raw markup, English entries with topic categories using raw markup, English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 12 64 24 Disambiguation of English entries with language name categories using raw markup: 18 57 25 Disambiguation of English entries with topic categories using raw markup: 23 53 24 Disambiguation of English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys: 22 54 24
  2. Used encouragingly or to compliment. Categories (topical): People
    Sense id: en-son_of_a_gun-en-noun-myRw8QEz Disambiguation of People: 46 2 52

Inflected forms

Download JSON data for son of a gun meaning in English (5.5kB)

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          "type": "example"
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          "ref": "1690, anonymous author, Teagueland Jeſts, or Bogg-Witticisms, part 2, page 138",
          "text": "A plaugue tauke dee, dou damn’d Shon of a Gun, de Deevil carry dee away alive for me; […]",
          "type": "quotation"
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          "ref": "1726, The British Apollo, 3rd edition, volume 2, [London]: Theodore Sanders, page 379",
          "text": "You Apollo's son, You're a son of a gun",
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        {
          "ref": "2002, “The Seed (2.0)”, in Phrenology, performed by The Roots",
          "text": "I don't break, I can hold the chrome / And it's weighing a ton and I'm a son of a gun",
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          "text": "You son of a gun, you did it!",
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          "text": "Son of a gun! I just got stung by a wasp!",
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        "(euphemistic) Used to express anger, contempt, disgust, astonishment, disappointment, etc."
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          "lang": "Arabic",
          "roman": "ibnu l-fāʕilati",
          "sense": "euphemism",
          "tags": [
            "masculine"
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          "word": "اِبْنُ الفَاعِلَةِ"
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          "code": "fr",
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          "sense": "euphemism",
          "word": "ça alors"
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          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "euphemism",
          "word": "skurczybyk"
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      "text": "→ Spanish: sanamagón"
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  "word": "son of a gun"
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        "masculine"
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    },
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      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "euphemism",
      "word": "ça alors"
    },
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      "sense": "euphemism",
      "word": "skurczybyk"
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      "sense": "euphemism",
      "tags": [
        "masculine"
      ],
      "word": "ку́рицын сын"
    }
  ],
  "word": "son of a gun"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-03 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

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