Flotilla
noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A small fleet of warships (usually of the same class), or a fleet of small ships.
"Toward the horizon a flotilla of fishing-boats showed immutable, pink-lacquered by the evening sun."
- 2 a fleet of small craft wordnet
- 3 A small group of things or people broadly
"After a few moments Chloe saw Rosamund walking towards them with a small flotilla of shopping bags."
- 4 a United States Navy fleet consisting of two or more squadrons of small warships wordnet
- 5 A spaceship made of one or more central mutually stabilizing overweight spaceships flanked by lightweight, middleweight, or heavyweight spaceships that prevent the formation of destructive eggs.
"For rule R(2222) a flotilla of six gliders traveling eastwards is generated."
Example
More examples"Gargantia on the Verdurous Planet, a Japanese sci-fi anime, describes humanity going through several ice ages before it branches into an advanced space civilization and space-adapted monsters. The Earth becomes a water planet with some survivors in a flotilla."
Etymology
From Spanish flotilla, diminutive of flota (“fleet”), from French flotte.
More for "flotilla"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.