Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Clever or cunning, especially in the practice of deceit.
- adj. Stealthy or surreptitious: took a sly look at the letter on the table.
- adj. Playfully mischievous: a sly laugh.
- idiom. on the sly In a way intended to escape notice: took extra payments on the sly.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- . Cunning; skilful; shrewd.
- Meanly artful; insidious; crafty.
- Playfully artful; knowing; having an intentionally transparent artfulness.
- Artfully and delicately wrought; cunning; ingenious.
- Thin; fine; slight; slender.
- Illicit: as, sly grog (liquor made in illicit stills).
- Synonyms and
- Cunning, Artful, Sly, etc. (sec cunning).
- Roguish, playful, waggish.
Wiktionary
- adj. Artfully cunning; secretly mischievous; wily.
- adj. Dexterous in performing an action, so as to escape notice; nimble; skillful; cautious; shrewd; knowing; — in a good sense.
- adj. Done with, and marked by, artful and dexterous secrecy; subtle; as, a sly trick.
- adj. Light or delicate; slight; thin.
- adv. Slyly.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Dexterous in performing an action, so as to escape notice; nimble; skillful; cautious; shrewd; knowing; -- in a good sense.
- adj. Artfully cunning; secretly mischievous; wily.
- adj. Done with, and marked by, artful and dexterous secrecy; subtle.
- adj. Light or delicate; slight; thin.
- adv. Slyly.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. marked by skill in deception
Etymologies
- Middle English sleigh, from Old Norse slœgr.
Examples
“Wes Anderson animated a classic Roald Dahl story and cast the vocal talents of George Clooney as the title sly fox.”
“I also would like to write in my vote for Bruce Campbell to be in this movie. joe story sounds decent. but i don't know how good the script will be if sly is writing it. the cast sounds good, but i don't know how well jet li will fit into a more traditional action movie rather than a kung fu movie.”
Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham and Jet Li to Team Up For The Expendables | /Film
“She held her expression sly and walked Runtly away.”
Immortalis
“In fact, all along she has been impressing on me in sly terms, that my absence was felt to be good company at Cheyne Row; and that if I ever came back it would be at the risk of spoiling everybody's good humour!!”
“One day he called sly Mercury, who had wings on his shoes, and bade him go and lead the cow away from the grove where she was kept.”
“Im disappointed in vh1s top songs. they are just getting more out of key with veiwers by adding fillers like creed and korn. i would rather call sly and family stone more popular "hard rock" evanesance.”
““The fear of camera-fitted mobile phones which can take pictures of a woman on the sly, is keeping a number of Qatari women away from beauty salons,” the Peninsula On-line reports.””
Smart Mobs » Blog Archive » Qatari women and camera-fitted mobile phones
“He rebuilds a lab, on the sly, that is humongous, an undertaking requiring great wealth and a greater amount of equipment and manpower.”
“A minute later it was Mosselet’s turn to come in, a cigarette between his lips, his expression sly and condescending.”
Storm in the Channel
“Sawney's warning against doing things on the sly was a clever way of teaching a more fundamental principle: be honest, be truthful.”
Charles Alexander: Global Warming: a Test for the Next Greatest Generation
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘sly’.
-
GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4084 more...
-
bad memory
copper, anvil, oblique, thrust, shrine, welfare, farewell, bitter, faction, sectarian, tangible, spectacle and 132 more...
-
Common English Words That Are Also First Names.
art, bob, bill, grace, hope, john, heather, pat, amber, jack, dale, glen and 170 more...
-
3 Letter Words
A list of English words that are three letters long.
ace, act, ade, ado, add, ads, age, ago, ail, air, aim, all and 397 more...
-
Words that look like adverbs but aren't
manly, womanly, ungainly, slovenly, homily, costly, dastardly, family, sparkly, wrinkly, oily, orderly and 69 more...
-
Viking Words
From http://www.vikingrune.com/2009/10/viking-words-in-english/
anger, birth, bleak, bloom, call, cast, crawl, crook, die, fellow, gear, get and 36 more...
-
Secrets
those sly words
Comments
No comments yet...
Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.