slipor

Forms

slipor^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-West Germanic *slipr, from Proto-Germanic *slipraz (“slippery, smooth”).^[1][2] The adjective is found only in West Germanic: beside Old English it occurs in Old High German sleffar (“slippery, steep”) and, later, Middle Low German slipper (“slippery, smooth”).^[3][2][4] Heidermanns and Orel explain it as a verbal adjective to the strong verb Proto-Germanic *slīpaną (“to slide, make smooth”), continued in Old English slīpan.^[2][3] Orel compares a Greek gloss in Hesychius meaning “slippery, smooth”, and Köbler connects the family with the root Proto-Indo-European *sleyb- (“slimy, to glide”).^[2][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The word is recorded only in late manuscripts: most of its occurrences are glosses on Latin “lubricus” in the hymnals and psalters, and none of them stands in a manuscript dated in the DOE Corpus.^[6][7]

Semantic evolution

Bosworth and Toller distinguish the senses “slippery, hard to hold” (the devil is a slippery serpent, rendering “serpens lubricus” in the Liber Scintillarum), “slipping easily, unsteady” (in Ælfric's homilies), and “foul”, where the hymn glosses pair it with fūl over “lubricus”.^[7] Toller's Supplement adds “uncertain, without fixed principles”, of the slippery years of youth in the Rule of Chrodegang, rendering “lubrice etatis”.^[8] Sweet and Holthausen give the moral senses “unstable” and “impure, filthy”.^[9][4] The noun slipornes (“foulness”) glosses Latin “lubrica” in the same hymnal.^[7]

It continued as Middle English sliper, “slippery; deceitful, unreliable; vile”, which Shakespeare still uses (“a slipper and subtle knave”); the English word slippery is a derivative.^[10][7][4]

Meanings

Adjective

1. slippery, hard to hold, moving easily.^[7][5]
2. slipping easily, easily moved, unsteady.^[7]
3. uncertain, without fixed principles; morally unstable.^[8][9]
4. (glosses) foul, impure.^[7][9]

Word family

• slipornes

Descendants

• Middle English sliper (→ English slipper; Scots slipper; Scots slippir)^[1]

Related words

• slǣp
• slipa

References

1. ^ a b c d Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill, p. 351
3. ^ a b Heidermanns, Frank (1993), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der germanischen Primäradjektive, Berlin / New York: De Gruyter
4. ^ a b c Holthausen, Ferdinand (1934), Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 299
5. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Altenglisches Wörterbuch, 4th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling, p. s.v. slipor
6. ^ Healey, Antonette diPaolo; Price Wilkin, John; Xiang, Xin, eds. (2009), Dictionary of Old English Web Corpus, Toronto: Dictionary of Old English Project
7. ^ a b c d e f g Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. 885
8. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. Suppl. 705
9. ^ a b c Sweet, Henry (1896), The Student's Dictionary of Anglo-Saxon, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 178
10. ^ Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)