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fife

Pronunciation: /ˈfaɪf/

The English word “fife” has 3 meanings listed here.

noun

  1. A small shrill pipe, resembling the piccolo flute, used chiefly to accompany the drum in military music

verb

  1. To play this instrument.

numeral

  1. Used instead of five in radio communications, especially NATO and ICAO, to avoid confusion with fire or nine.

Etymology

From German Pfeife (“whistle, smoking pipe”). Doublet of pipe.

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.