A line or row of guns positioned for battle, or the line of fire from a gun or battery of guns.
Compound of 'gun' (Middle Dutch 'gonne') and 'line' (from Latin 'linea'). Military term that emerged during the Age of Sail to describe ship formations.
The gunline became legendary in naval warfare—the Civil War ironclad USS Monitor and CSS Virginia faced off in the first modern naval gunline battle, revolutionizing how wars at sea would be fought forever.
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