slink
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /slɪŋk/
rhymes: -ɪŋk
Forms: form: slinks
form: slinking
form: slunk
form: slunk
form: slank
form: slank
Etymology: From Middle English slynken, sclynken, from Old English slincan (“to creep; crawl”), from Proto-Germanic *slinkaną (“to creep; crawl”), from Proto-Indo-European *sleng-, *slenk- (“to turn; wind; twist”), from Proto-Indo-European *sel- (“to sneak; crawl”).
Cognate with West Frisian slinke, Dutch slinken (“to shrink; shrivel”), Low German slinken, Swedish slinka (“to glide”). Compare also German schleichen (“to slink”). More at sleek.
Senses: examples: text: As we do turn our backs
From our companion thrown into his grave,
So his familiars to his buried fortunes
Slink all away, leave their false vows with him,
Like empty purses pick’d; and his poor self,
A dedicated beggar to the air,
With his disease of all-shunn’d poverty,
Walks, like contempt, alone.
ref: c. 1605–1608 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Tymon of Athens”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene ii]:
text: Back to the thicket slunk the guilty serpent.
ref: 1667, John Milton, “Book IX”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:
text: The leaving us was just a feint; / Back here to London did he slink, / And now works on without a wink / Of sleep, and we are on the brink
ref: 1842, Robert Browning, Waring:
text: Joseph Poorgrass, in the background, twitched, and his lips became dry with fear of some terrible consequences as he saw Bathsheba summarily speaking, and Henery slinking off to a corner.
ref: 1874, Thomas Hardy, Far from the Madding Crowd. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Smith, Elder & Co., […], →OCLC:
text: Far away I saw a gaunt cat slink crouchingly along a wall, but traces of men there were none.
ref: 1895–1897, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, “The Stillness”, in The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, published 1898, →OCLC, book II (The Earth under the Martians), page 239:
text: How meek and shrunken did that haughty Tarmac become as it slunk by the wide circle of asphalt of the yellow sort, that was loosely strewn before the great iron gates of Lady Hall as a forerunner of the consideration that awaited the guests of Rupert, Earl of Kare, […].
ref: 1922, Michael Arlen, “3/1/1”, in “Piracy”: A Romantic Chronicle of These Days:
text: Earnest slunk backstage.
ref: 2013 November, Glenn Thrush, “Locked in the Cabinet”, in POLITICO:
text: I have arrived to catch the 0830 TfW service to Crewe, worked by a tatty and unrefurbished 175114. As if ashamed of its appearance, it slinks into Platform 2 (instead of Platform 1, where it was expected). No announcement had been made, and we leave without any fanfare.
ref: 2020 December 2, Paul Bigland, “My weirdest and wackiest Rover yet”, in Rail, page 67:
glosses: To sneak about furtively.
examples: text: a cow that slinks her calf
glosses: To give birth to an animal prematurely.