Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- To abate; diminish.
- To moderate; mitigate; appease; satisfy.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- verb Archaic To mitigate; to moderate; to appease; to abate; to diminish.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- verb transitive, intransitive To
abate ;diminish . - verb transitive, intransitive To
moderate ;mitigate ;appease ;satisfy .
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
From Middle English aslaken, from Old English āslacian ("to become slack, decline, diminish, grow tired, make slack, loosen, relax, dissolve"), from Proto-Germanic *uz- (“out”) + *slakōnan (“to become useless, weak, or slow”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)lēg- (“soft, weak”), equivalent to a- + slake. Cognate with Dutch slaken ("to heave"), Swedish sloka ("to wilt, droop"), Danish slukke ("to quench, allay, slake"). More at slake.
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Examples
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Furies > (In later accounts, Tisiphone, Megaera, and Alecto, three goddesses who guard the gates of hell; in earlier accounts, they are avenging deities, of indeterminate number, sent from hell to punish wrongdoers) aslake > assuage; cool
The Faerie Queene — Volume 01 Edmund Spenser
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But this continuall cruell ciuill warre, the which my selfe against my selfe doe make: whilest my weak powres of passions warreid arre. no skill can stint nor reason can aslake.
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