Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Having or characterized by a single slope or pitch: a lean-to roof; lean-to construction.
- n. A structure with a single-pitch roof that is attached to the side of a building as a wing or an extension.
- n. A shelter or shed having a roof with a single slope or pitch.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Having rafters or supports pitched against or leaning on another building, a wall, or the like: as, a lean-to roof.
- n. A building whose rafters or supports pitch against or lean upon another building, or against a wall, or the like; a penthouse.
Wiktionary
- n. A shelter with a sloped roof; also a building with a similar construction attached to the side of a building as an extension.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. (Arch.) Having only one slope or pitch; -- said of a roof.
- n. (Arch.) A shed or slight building placed against the wall of a larger structure and having a single-pitched roof; -- called also
penthouse , andto-fall . - n. A crude, usually temporary shelter comprising a lean-to roof braced against any convenient support, as a wall, a tree or a pole. The roof may extend all the way to the ground.
WordNet 3.0
- n. rough shelter whose roof has only one slope
Etymologies
- First attested 1461. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“How does a disadvantaged teen, who is living in a lean-to in a remote village in Kenya, gain access to a college education, when most of her peers become parents in high school?”
The Huffington Post: Natalie Pace: Microsoft: Skype's New Owner Empowers Girls in Kenya
“The cooking being done in the small, lean-to kitchen, the whole cabin formed a large living room.”
“I lived in the lean-to the first year; then I built the cabin and sent for my books.”
“I looked up from the shelter of our lean-to, and there he stood.”
“Even a lean-to needs two uprights and a crosspiece.”
“Consider yourself lucky and use that Lone Star flag of yours as a lean-to.”
“Poverty here is similarly appalling, not only in Chennai's slums, but throughout the city, where makeshift lean-to's butt up against the walls of the Madras High Court.”
“Jared Ropelato's lean-to – a crude structure the Boy Scout manual advises Scouts to build if they become lost – kept him warm enough so he could sleep after the overnight low in Ashley National Forest dipped to 31 degrees in the area, said Daggett County sheriff's spokeswoman Karen Peterson.”
The Huffington Post: Jared Ropelato, Lost Boy Scout, Safe After Night In Utah Forest
“Peterson also praised the boy, saying that building the lean-to was "good thinking" and it saved him from the elements.”
USA Today: Boy Scout safe after cold night in Utah wilderness
“The Americans were taken to a POW compound where there were already some 25 Americans held in a small, fenced-in area, with only a small lean-to in one corner to shield prisoners from the weather.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘lean-to’.
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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miserable circumstances
describing living arrangements from the less-than-stellar, to the sordid
burrow, garret, ghetto, hovel, hut, lean-to, cavern, shack, shanty, shed, slum, tenement and 59 more...
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Tuesday words
just the next words that come along
nasality, transignification, lapsarian, disciple, slanguage, atwitter, avast, ahoy, asleep, awake, hymnody, glissade and 573 more...
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miscellanea
antimacassar, snootful, sessile, glagolitic, marrowsky, farrago, keel, calumny, rheum, talisman, tally, awry and 508 more...
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Storm Thief
Words and phrases from Chris Wooding's book, Storm Thief.
chit, lean-to, panopticon, hobnail, periscope, shanty, flout, racket, lathe, dynamo, kiln, gurn and 44 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for lean-to.
bilby 'Formerly a high judicial officer' makes it sound as if he/she has been dewigged by a scandal. Apr 11, 2008