fuse

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
fuse1

▶verb

• 1 join, blend, or coalesce to form a single entity.

• 2 melt (a material or object) with intense heat, so as to join it with something else.

• 3 Brit. (with reference to an electrical appliance) stop or cause to stop working when a fuse melts.

• 4 provide (a circuit or electrical appliance) with a fuse.

▶noun a safety device consisting of a strip of wire that melts and breaks an electric circuit if the current exceeds a safe level.

– origin C16: from L. fus-, fundere ‘pour, melt’.

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
fuse2 (US also fuze)

▶noun a length of material along which a small flame moves to explode a bomb or firework.

■ a device in a bomb that controls the timing of the explosion.

▶verb fit a fuse to (a bomb).

– derivatives
fuseless adjective.

– origin C17: from Ital. fuso, from L. fusus ‘spindle’.