Infantry

How to spell infantry

8 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce infantry

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does infantry mean?

1. nounSoldiers who are trained and equipped to fight on foot, as opposed to cavalry or armoured units.

Infantry in a sentence

• The infantry advanced slowly across the muddy field while artillery covered them.

• His grandfather served in the infantry during the war and rarely spoke about it.

Where does infantry come from?

Language of origin: Italian

This word reaches English through the language of Renaissance warfare. It comes from the French infanterie, which the French had borrowed from the Italian infanteria, a collective term for foot soldiers. The Italian word was built on infante, which originally meant 'youth' or 'young attendant', from the Latin infans, literally 'one unable to speak' and so by extension a child or very young person. In military use the junior soldiers who marched and fought on foot, rather than the higher-status mounted cavalry, came to be called by this term. English adopted it in the late sixteenth century as armies were reorganised, and the same Latin infans root sits inside the everyday word 'infant', which is a useful reminder that the tricky middle of the word is spelled 'infant' before the '-ry' is added.

How the word is built

• infant- (from Italian infante: youth, foot soldier; ultimately Latin infans, unable to speak)
• -ry (noun suffix denoting a collective body)