sliver

Valid in Scrabble

Scrabble points
9
Words With Friends
11
Letters
6
Pronunciation
/ˈslɪv.ə(ɹ)/ (UK)
See all 2 pronunciations
/ˈslɪv.ə(ɹ)/ (UK) · /ˈslɪv.ɚ/ (US)

Definition of sliver

7 senses · 2 parts of speech · etymology included

noun

  1. A long piece cut or rent off; a sharp, slender fragment.
    “This is the tasting ritual, the lay Eucharist of cheese. The buyer squeezes the sliver of cheese between his fingers to test its consistency, sniffs it, and then tastes it as delicately as if it were the most subtle caviar.”
    “A sliver of bone has punctured a lung, and a small surgical operation was needed to remove it (would he like to keep the bone as a memento?--it is in a phial by his bedside).”
See all 7 definitions

noun

  1. A long piece cut or rent off; a sharp, slender fragment.
    “This is the tasting ritual, the lay Eucharist of cheese. The buyer squeezes the sliver of cheese between his fingers to test its consistency, sniffs it, and then tastes it as delicately as if it were the most subtle caviar.”
    “A sliver of bone has punctured a lung, and a small surgical operation was needed to remove it (would he like to keep the bone as a memento?--it is in a phial by his bedside).”
  2. (Canada, Essex, Kent)A long piece cut or rent off; a sharp, slender fragment.
  3. A strand, or slender roll, of cotton or other fiber in a loose, untwisted state, produced by a carding machine and ready for the roving or slubbing which precedes spinning.
  4. Bait made of pieces of small fish.
  5. (New-York, US)A narrow high-rise apartment building.
  6. A small amount of something; a drop in the bucket; a shred.

verb

  1. (transitive)To cut or divide into long, thin pieces, or into very small pieces; to cut or rend lengthwise; to slit.
    “to sliver wood”
    “slips of yew, Sliver'd in the moon's eclipse”
    “They'll sliver thee like a turnip.”

Definitions from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA.

Etymology

From Middle English slivere, sliver from Middle English sliven (“to cut, cleave, split”), from Old English slīfan (as in tōslīfan (“to split, split up”)).

Hooks

1 extension · 1 back

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