different between slope vs aslope

English

Etymology

From aslope (adjective, adverb).

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /slo?p/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /sl??p/
• Rhymes: -??p

Noun

slope (countable and uncountable, plural slopes)

1. An area of ground that tends evenly upward or downward.

2. The degree to which a surface tends upward or downward.

3. (mathematics) The ratio of the vertical and horizontal distances between two points on a line; zero if the line is horizontal, undefined if it is vertical.

4. (mathematics) The slope of the line tangent to a curve at a given point.

5. The angle a roof surface makes with the horizontal, expressed as a ratio of the units of vertical rise to the units of horizontal length (sometimes referred to as run).

6. (vulgar, offensive, ethnic slur) A person of Chinese or other East Asian descent.

Synonyms

• (area of ground that tends evenly upward or downward): bank, embankment, gradient, hill, incline
• (degree to which a surface tends upward or downward): gradient
• (mathematics): first derivative, gradient
• (offensive: Chinese person): Chinaman, Chink

Translations

Verb

slope (third-person singular simple present slopes, present participle sloping, simple past and past participle sloped)

1. (intransitive) To tend steadily upward or downward.
2. (transitive) To form with a slope; to give an oblique or slanting direction to; to incline or slant.

3. (colloquial, usually followed by a preposition) To try to move surreptitiously.

4. (military) To hold a rifle at a slope with forearm perpendicular to the body in front holding the butt, the rifle resting on the shoulder.

Derived terms

• ski slope
• slippery slope
• Slope County
• sloping

Translations

Adjective

slope (comparative more slope, superlative most slope)

1. (obsolete) Sloping.
   • 1625, Francis Bacon, Of Gardens

     A bank not steep, but gently slope.

Adverb

slope (comparative more slope, superlative most slope)

1. (obsolete) slopingly

Anagrams

• LEPOs, Poles, S-pole, eslop, lopes, olpes, poles, spole

Dutch

Pronunciation

Verb

slope

1. (archaic) singular past subjunctive of sluipen
2. (archaic) singular present subjunctive of slopen

Anagrams

• sloep, spoel

English

Etymology

From Middle English aslope, probably from or akin to Old English ?slopen, past participle of Old English ?sl?pan (“to slip away”).

Adjective

aslope (not comparable)

1. (archaic) Slanted or sloping.

   Synonyms: diagonal, oblique

   • 1830, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “Love, Hope, and Patience in Education” in The Poetical Works of S. T. Coleridge, London: William Pickering, 1834, Volume 3, p. 331,^[1]

     Methinks, I see them group’d in seemly show,

     The straiten’d arms uprais’d, the palms aslope,

   • 1911, G. K. Chesterton, The Innocence of Father Brown, The Honor of Israel Gow

     Far as the eye could see, farther and farther as they mounted the slope, were seas beyond seas of pines, now all aslope one way under the wind.

Adverb

aslope (not comparable)

1. (archaic) Slanted or sloping.

   Synonyms: diagonally, obliquely

   • 1516, Robert Fabyan, Fabyan’s Chronicle, London: William Rastell, 1533, Part 7,^[2]

     But the Flemynges with theyr arbalasters and theyr longe mareys pykes set aslope before them wounded so theyr horses, that they lay tumbelynge one in the others necke […]

   • 1674, Charles Cotton, The Compleat Gamester, London: R. Cutler, Chapter 5, p. 55,^[3]

     The Bishop walks always in the same colour of the field that he is first placed in, forward and backward asloap every way as far as he lists;

   • 1710, Jonathan Swift, “A Description of a City Shower” in Miscellanies, London: Benjamin Motte, 1733, Volume 4, p. 141,^[4]

     Brisk Susan whips her Linnen from the Rope,

     While the first drizzling Show’r is born aslope,

   • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick, New York: Harper, Chapter 134, p. 617,^[5]

     While the two crews were yet circling in the waters […] , while aslope little Flask bobbed up and down like an empty vial, twitching his legs upward to escape the dreaded jaws of sharks;

2. (archaic, figuratively) In an unintended or unfavourable direction.

   Synonym: off course

   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, London: William Ponsonby, Book 3, Canto 4, p. 459,^[6]

     His wicked fortune, that had turnd aslope

   • 1674, John Milton, Paradise Lost, London: S. Simmons, Book 10, p. 282,^[7]

     […] On mee the Curse aslope

     Glanc’d on the ground, with labour I must earne

     My bread; what harm?

Preposition

aslope

1. (archaic) Diagonally over or across.

   Synonyms: aslant, athwart

   • 1616, Thomas Middleton, Civitas Amor, London: Thomas Archer, “Prince Charles his Creation,”^[8]

     […] the King […] puts the Belt ouer the necke of the Knight, aslope his breast, placing the Sword vnder his left Arme:

   • 1899, Madison Cawein, “The Last Song” in Myth and Romance, New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, pp. 29-30,^[9]

     A lute, aslope

     The curious baldric of his tunic, glints

     With pearl-reflections of the moon,

Anagrams

• El Paso