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slashes

 - 4 dictionary results

slash

1  [slash]
Use slashes in a Sentence
–verb (used with object)
1. to cut with a violent sweeping stroke or by striking violently and at random, as with a knife or sword.
2. to lash; whip.
3. to cut, reduce, or alter: The editors slashed the story to half its length.
4. to make slits in (a garment) to show an underlying fabric.
5. to criticize, censure, or attack in a savage or cutting manner.
–verb (used without object)
6. to lay about one with sharp, sweeping strokes; make one's way by cutting.
7. to make a sweeping, cutting stroke.
–noun
8. a sweeping stroke, as with a knife, sword, or pen.
9. a cut, wound, or mark made with such a stroke.
10. a curtailment, reduction, or alteration: a drastic slash of prices.
11. a decorative slit in a garment showing an underlying fabric.
12. virgule.
13. (in forest land)
a. an open area strewn with debris of trees from felling or from wind or fire.
b. the debris itself.
Origin:
1350–1400; ME slaschen < ?

Synonyms:
3. abridge, abbreviate.

slash

2  [slash]
–noun
Often, slashes. a tract of wet or swampy ground overgrown with bushes or trees.
Origin:
1645–55, Americanism; orig. uncert.

vir⋅gule

  [vur-gyool]
–noun Printing.
1. a short oblique stroke (/) between two words indicating that whichever is appropriate may be chosen to complete the sense of the text in which they occur: The defendant and/or his/her attorney must appear in court.
2. a dividing line, as in dates, fractions, a run-in passage of poetry to show verse division, etc.: 3/21/27; 3/4; Sweetest love I do not go/For weariness of thee.
Also called diagonal, separatrix, shilling mark, slant, slash, solidus; especially British, stroke.

Origin:
1830–40; < F virgule comma, little rod < L virgula; see virgulate
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
Cite This Source Link To slashes
slash   (slāsh)   
v.   slashed, slash·ing, slash·es

v.   tr.

  1. To cut or form by cutting with forceful sweeping strokes: slash a path through the underbrush.

  2. To lash with sweeping strokes.

  3. To make a gash or gashes in.

  4. Sports To swing a stick at (an opponent) in ice hockey or lacrosse, in violation of the rules.

  5. To cut a slit or slits in, especially so as to reveal an underlying color: slash a sleeve.

  6. To criticize sharply: The reviewers slashed the composer's work.

  7. To reduce or curtail drastically: slash prices for a clearance sale.

v.   intr.

  1. To make forceful sweeping strokes with or as if with a sharp instrument.

  2. To cut one's way with such strokes: We slashed through the dense jungle.

n.  

  1. A forceful sweeping stroke made with a sharp instrument.

  2. A long cut or other opening made by such a stroke; a gash or slit.

  3. A decorative slit in a fabric or garment.

  4. Branches and other residue left on a forest floor after the cutting of timber.

  5. Wet or swampy ground overgrown with bushes and trees. Often used in the plural.

  6. Printing A virgule.

conj.   Informal
As well as; and. Used in combination and often rendered as a virgule in print: an actor-slash-writer; a waiter/dancer.

[Perhaps from obsolete French esclachier, to break, variant of esclater, from Old French, from esclat, splinter; see slat.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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