Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To move in a quiet furtive manner; sneak.
  • intransitive verb To give birth to prematurely.
  • adjective Born prematurely.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To sneak; steal or move quietly: generally with off or away.
  • noun A sneaking fellow.
  • noun A greedy starveling.
  • noun A cheat.
  • noun A small piece of wet meadow-land.
  • Thin; slender; lean; starved and hungry: as, slink cattle.
  • Sneaky; mean.
  • noun The skin of a still-born calf. Also slunk.
  • To cast prematurely: said of a female boast.
  • To miscarry; cast the young prematurely: said of a female boast.
  • noun An animal, especially a calf, prematurely brought forth.
  • noun The flesh of an animal prematurely brought forth; the veal of a calf killed immediately after being calved; bob-veal.
  • noun A bastard child.
  • noun A thin or poor and bony fish, especially such a mackerel. See mackerel.
  • Produced prematurely: as, a slink calf.
  • Immature and unfit for human food: as, slink veal; slink meat.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To creep away meanly; to steal away; to sneak.
  • transitive verb To miscarry; -- said of female beasts.
  • transitive verb To cast prematurely; -- said of female beasts.
  • adjective Produced prematurely.
  • adjective Scot. Thin; lean.
  • noun The young of a beast brought forth prematurely, esp. a calf brought forth before its time.
  • noun Prov. Eng. & Scot. A thievish fellow; a sneak.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb intransitive To sneak about furtively.
  • verb transitive To give birth to an animal prematurely.
  • noun The young of an animal when born prematurely, especially a calf.
  • noun UK, Scotland, dialect A thievish fellow; a sneak.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb walk stealthily

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English slinken, from Old English slincan.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Old English slincan ("to creep, crawl"), from Proto-Germanic *slenkanan (compare Dutch slinken ("to shrink, shrivel"), Swedish slinka ("to glide")).

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