# thin
## English
### Etymology

From Middle English thinne, thünne, thenne, from Old English þynne, from Proto-West Germanic *þunnī, from Proto-Germanic *þunnuz (“thin”) – compare *þanjaną (“to stretch, spread out”) – from Proto-Indo-European *ténh₂us (“thin”), from *ten- (“to stretch”).
Cognate with German dünn, Dutch dun, West Frisian tin, Icelandic þunnur, Danish tynd, Swedish tunn, Latin tenuis, Irish tanaí, Welsh tenau, Latvian tievs, Polish cienki, Russian тонкий (tonkij), Sanskrit तनु (tanú, “thin”), Persian تنگ (tang, “narrow”). Doublet of tenuis. Also related to tenuous.

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /θɪn/
* (th-fronting) IPA: /fɪn/
* Audio (US):(file)
* Audio:(file)
* Rhymes: -ɪn
* Homophone: fin (th-fronting)

### Adjective

thin (comparative thinner, superlative thinnest)
* Having little thickness or extent from one surface to its opposite.
    thin plate of metal; thin paper; thin board; thin covering
** 1853, Charles MacFarlane, Kismet: or, The doom of Turkey, page 66:It was no mystery at all, or a mystery covered only with the thinnest and most transparent veil, that forced abortion is a common practice among Turkish women. The horrible secret as to the means and the drugs to be employed is pretty generally known, and where ignorance prevails there are "wise women," old hags, professional abortists, who go about the country relieving matrons of their burthens for a few piastres apiece […]
** 1943 November – 1944 February (date written; published 1945 August 17), George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], Animal Farm […], London: Secker & Warburg, published May 1962, →OCLC:Out of spite, the human beings pretended not to believe that it was Snowball who had destroyed the windmill: they said that it had fallen down because the walls were too thin.
* Very narrow in all diameters; having a cross section that is small in all directions.
    thin wire; thin string
** 2015 July 6, “Assessment of the Impact of Zoledronic Acid on Ovariectomized Osteoporosis Model Using Micro-CT Scanning”, in PLOS ONE‎, →DOI:Typically, osteoporosis causes the amount of trabecular bone to be reduced and the bone to become thinner, while the intertrabecular space enlarges and the interconnected structure of trabecular bone is disrupted.
* Having little body fat or flesh; slim; slender; lean; gaunt.
    thin person
* Of low viscosity or low specific gravity.
    Water is thinner than honey.
* Scarce; not close, crowded, or numerous; not filling the space.
    The trees of a forest are thin; the corn or grass is thin.
** 1705, J[oseph] Addison, Remarks on Several Parts of Italy, &c. in the Years 1701, 1702, 1703, London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC:Ferrara is very large, but extremely thin of people.
* (golf) Describing a poorly played golf shot where the ball is struck by the bottom part of the club head. See fat, shank, toe.
* Lacking body or volume; small; feeble; not full.
    a thin, tight-lipped smile
** 1690, [John] Dryden, Don Sebastian, King of Portugal: […], London: […] Jo. Hindmarsh, […], →OCLC, (please specify the page number):thin, hollow sounds, and lamentable screams
* Slight; small; slender; flimsy; superficial; inadequate; not sufficient for a covering.
    a thin disguise
* (aviation) Of a route: relatively little used.
** 2016, Hartmut Wolf, Peter Forsyth, David Gillen, Liberalization in Aviation, page 105:In short, we previously found that thin routes benefit from an increase in competition in the Spanish airline market when considering routes that were monopoly routes in 2001.
* Poor; scanty; without money or success.
** 1945, Jack Henry, What Price Crime?, page 92:Like their friends the "draggers," the "hoisters" or shoplifters are having a thin time these days, […]

#### Synonyms

* (having little thickness from one surface to its opposite): narrow; see also Thesaurus:narrow
* (very narrow in all diameters): fine
* (having little body fat or flesh): reedy, skinny, slender, slim, svelte, waifish; see also Thesaurus:slender or Thesaurus:scrawny
* (of low viscosity): runny, watery; see also Thesaurus:runny
* (not close or crowded): spaced out, sparse; see also Thesaurus:diffuse
* (not numerous): scant, scarce, slight

#### Antonyms

* thick

#### Derived terms

* gossamer-thin
* have a thin time of it
* into thin air
* on thin ice
* out of thin air
* paper-thin
* pencil-thin
* razor-thin
* razor thin
* run thin
* skate on thin ice
* spread oneself thin
* spread oneself too thin
* stick-thin
* thick and thin
* thick-and-thin block
* thin air
* thin as a barber's cat
* thin as a rail
* thin as a rake
* thin as a wafer
* thin as a yard of pump water
* thin blue line
* thinclad
* thin client
* thin computing
* thin content
* thin-crust pizza
* thin edge of the wedge
* thin end of the wedge
* thin-film
* thin film
* thin-layer chromatography
* thin layer chromatography
* thinly
* thin on the ground
* thin paper
* thin sandwich course
* thin sandwich degree
* thin section
* thin skin
* thin-skinned
* thin-skinnedness
* thin skull rule
* thin slice
* thin-slice
* thin-slicing
* thin space
* thinspiration
* thin the herd
* thin trading
* through thick and thin
* wafer-thin
* wear thin

#### Related terms

* thinness

#### Translations

    The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

### Noun

thin (plural thins)
* (philately) A loss or tearing of paper from the back of a stamp, although not sufficient to create a complete hole.
* Any food produced or served in thin slices.
    chocolate mint thins
    potato thins
    wheat thins

#### Translations
### Verb

thin (third-person singular simple present thins, present participle thinning, simple past and past participle thinned)
* (transitive) To make thin or thinner.
** 1941, Theodore Roethke, “Feud”, in Open House; republished in The Collected Poems of Theodore Roethke, 1975, →ISBN, page 4:Exhausted fathers thinned the blood, You curse the legacy of pain; Darling of an infected brood, You feel disaster climb the vein.
* (intransitive) To become thin or thinner.
    The crowds thinned after the procession had passed: there was nothing more to see.
* To dilute.
* To remove some plants or parts of plants in order to improve the growth of what remains.
** 2015 September 5, Mark Diacono, “In praise of the Asian pear”, in The Daily Telegraph (Gardening)‎, archived from the original on 12 September 2015, page 3:So floriferous are Asian pears, and the tree so laden with young fruit, that as the tree approaches maturity it is worth considering thinning the fruit (I can't quite bring myself to thin the flowers) so as to neither overburden the tree for this year nor tire it for the next. Thinning early in the season, while the fruit is small, is ideal.

#### Derived terms

* thin down
* thinner
* thin out
* thin up

#### Translations
### Adverb

thin (comparative more thin, superlative most thin)
* Not thickly or closely; in a scattered state.
    seed sown thin
** a. 1627 (date written), Francis [Bacon], “Considerations Touching a VVarre vvith Spaine. […]”, in William Rawley, editor, Certaine Miscellany VVorks of the Right Honourable Francis Lo. Verulam, Viscount S. Alban. […], London: […] I. Hauiland for Humphrey Robinson, […], published 1629, →OCLC:Spain is a nation thin sown of people.

### Further reading

* “thin”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
* William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “thin”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
* “thin”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

### Anagrams

* Nith, hint

## Middle English
### Etymology 1
#### Determiner

thin (subjective pronoun þou)
* Alternative form of þin (“thy”)

#### Pronoun

thin (subjective þou)
* Alternative form of þin (“thine”)

### Etymology 2
#### Adjective

thin
* Alternative form of thinne (“thin”)

## Old Dutch
### Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *þīn.

### Determiner

thīn
* thy, your (singular)
* thine, yours

#### Descendants

* Middle Dutch: dijn
** Dutch: dijn
** Limburgish: dien

#### Further reading

* “thīn”, in Oudnederlands Woordenboek, 2012

## Old Frisian
### Alternative forms

* dīn

### Etymology

From Proto-West Germanic *þīn, whence also Old English þīn, Old High German dīn, Old Norse þinn.

### Determiner

thīn
* thy, your (singular)

#### Descendants

* West Frisian: dyn

### Pronoun

thīn
* genitive of thū: thine (yours)

#### Declension
## Old High German
### Pronunciation

* IPA: /ðiːn/

### Determiner

thīn
* Alternative form of din

#### References

* Joseph Wright, An Old High German Primer, Second Edition

## Old Saxon
### Etymology 1

From Proto-West Germanic *þīn.

#### Pronunciation

* IPA: /θiːn/
* (late Old Saxon) IPA: [ðiːn]

#### Determiner

thīn
* thy, your (singular)
* thine, yours

##### Declension
#### References

* Köbler, Gerhard, Altsächsisches Wörterbuch (5th edition 2014)
* Altsächsisches Elementarbuch by Dr. F. Holthausen

### Etymology 2

See here.

#### Determiner

thin
* instrumental singular masculine/neuter of thē

## Welsh
### Noun

thin
* Aspirate mutation of tin.

### Mutation

Note: Certain mutated forms of some words can never occur in standard Welsh. All possible mutated forms are displayed for convenience.