slit
pronunciation
How to pronounce slit in British English:
UK [slɪt]
How to pronounce slit in American English:
US [slɪt]
-
- Noun:
- a long narrow opening
- obscene terms for female genitals
- a depression scratched or carved into a surface
- a narrow fissure
-
- Verb:
- make a clean cut through
- cut a slit into
Word Origin
- slit
- slit: [13] Slit is not recorded in Old English, but it is assumed to have existed, as *slittan (its first cousin slītan ‘slit’ survived into the 20th century in Scottish English as slite). It goes back ultimately to the same Germanic base that produced English slice and possibly also slash, slat and slate.=> slice
- slit (v.)
- c. 1200, from or related to Old English slitan "to slit, tear, split, rend to pieces; bite, sting; back-bite," from Proto-Germanic *slitan (cognates: Old Saxon slitan, Old Frisian slita, Old Norse slita, Middle Low German and Middle Dutch sliten, Dutch slijten, Old High German slizan, German schleißen "to slit"). A more violent verb in Old English than after, as in slitcwealm "death by rending." Slit skirt is attested from 1913.A slitting-mill (1660s) cut iron plates into thin rods for making nails, etc.
- slit (n.)
- mid-13c., "long cut or rent (in clothes), incision," from slit (v.). Slang sense of "vulva" is attested from 1640s. Old English had slit (n.) with a sense of "a rending, bite; backbiting."
Example
- 1. And his shirt had a long slit .
- 2. They slit open the organisms and suck out the cytoplasm .
- 3. I notice one of the envelopes is too thick for the machine , and slit it open with my finger .
- 4. With a sharp knife , make a slit in the belly almost to the tail .
- 5. Progressive improvements in the design and material of artificial lenses mean it is now possible to roll them up , inject them into position in the eye through a narrow slit , and then have them unfold naturally into place .