slink
Part of speech: verb
noun
adj
Morphological type: simple
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.
Inflected forms:
form: slinks
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: slinking
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: slunk
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: slunk
pos: verb
tags: past
form: slinked
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: slinked
pos: verb
tags: past
form: slank
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
uncommon
form: slank
pos: verb
tags: past
uncommon
form: slinks
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: more slink
pos: adj
tags: comparative
form: most slink
pos: adj
tags: superlative
Senses:
gloss: To sneak about furtively.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: 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.
Back to the thicket slunk the guilty serpent.
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
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.
Far away I saw a gaunt cat slink crouchingly along a wall, but traces of men there were none.
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, […].
Earnest slunk backstage.
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.
gloss: To give birth to an animal prematurely.
pos: verb
tags: ambitransitive
examples: a cow that slinks her calf
gloss: A furtive sneaking motion.
pos: noun
tags: countable
examples: His slink became a stride; he held his tail high; his eyes began to look more curious than scared. But he was still cautious.
gloss: The young of an animal when born prematurely, especially a calf.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
gloss: The meat of such a prematurely born animal.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: It is an ascertained fact that young or “slink” veal very frequently gives rise to diarrhœa, more especially when that disease is epidemic.
gloss: A bastard child, one born out of wedlock.
pos: noun
tags: countable
obsolete
uncountable
gloss: A thievish fellow; a sneak.
pos: noun
tags: Scotland
UK
countable
dialectal
uncountable
gloss: Thin; lean
pos: adj
tags: Scotland
Translations: