The Spitfire was a small, fast single-seat British fighter plane used by the RAF in the Second World War. It is famous above all for the Battle of Britain in 1940, when British fighters fought off German bombing raids in the sky over southern England, and for most British people the word now means far more than an aircraft: it stands for that summer, for the young pilots, for holding on when things looked lost. You will hear it in that emotional way constantly — in films, at air shows, in newspaper headlines. Its shape is part of the fame too: curved, almost oval wings that anyone in Britain can recognise. A few dozen still fly today and people stop in the street to look up when one goes over. Two things beyond the plane. First, the word existed before the aircraft: a spitfire is a person, usually a woman, with a quick fierce temper — someone who flares up and answers back. That older sense is still alive, though it now sounds a bit old-fashioned and half-admiring rather than insulting. Second, note the capital letter: the plane is a Spitfire, the fiery person is a spitfire.