sipek

rolig commented on the word sipek

The venerable Slovar slovenskega knjižnega jezika (Dictionary of Standard Slovene) provides the following definition for this adjective (I translate): "being composed of tiny, small particles that do not cling to each other"; it gives the examples sipek pesek ("?? sand"), sipek sneg ("?? snow"). I suppose powdery would work (esp. for "snow"), but is there another word that conveys this sense of tiny, non-viscous dry particles that can slip through your fingers? The expression I needed to translate was "sipek čas" ("?? time"), which clearly meant to evoke the sand in an hourglass. Unable to think of a suitable adjective, I decided on "time slipping away".

November 22, 2009