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SHEER
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Complete and without restriction or qualification; sometimes used informally as intensifiers
Example:
sheer stupidity
Synonyms:
absolute; downright; out-and-out; rank; right-down; sheer
Classified under:
Similar:
complete (having every necessary or normal part or component or step)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Very steep; having a prominent and almost vertical front
Example:
a sheer descent of rock
Synonyms:
Classified under:
Similar:
steep (having a sharp inclination)
Sense 3
Meaning:
Not mixed with extraneous elements
Example:
not an unmixed blessing
Synonyms:
plain; sheer; unmingled; unmixed
Classified under:
Adjectives
Similar:
pure (free of extraneous elements of any kind)
Sense 4
Meaning:
So thin as to transmit light
Example:
vaporous silks
Synonyms:
cobwebby; diaphanous; filmy; gauze-like; gauzy; gossamer; see-through; sheer; transparent; vaporous; vapourous
Classified under:
Adjectives
Similar:
thin (of relatively small extent from one surface to the opposite or in cross section)
II. (verb)
Verb forms
Present simple: I / you / we / they sheer ... he / she / it sheers
Past simple: sheered
Past participle: sheered
-ing form: sheering
Sense 1
Meaning:
Cause to sheer
Example:
She sheered her car around the obstacle
Classified under:
Verbs of walking, flying, swimming
Hypernyms (to "sheer" is one way to...):
channelise; channelize; direct; guide; head; maneuver; manoeuver; manoeuvre; point; steer (direct the course; determine the direction of travelling)
Sentence frame:
Somebody ----s something
Sense 2
Meaning:
Turn sharply; change direction abruptly
Example:
The motorbike veered to the right
Synonyms:
curve; cut; sheer; slew; slue; swerve; trend; veer
Classified under:
Verbs of walking, flying, swimming
Hypernyms (to "sheer" is one way to...):
turn (change orientation or direction, also in the abstract sense)
Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "sheer"):
peel off (leave a formation)
yaw (swerve off course momentarily)
Sentence frames:
Something ----s
Something is ----ing PP
III. (adverb)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Directly
Example:
he fell sheer into the water
Classified under:
Sense 2
Meaning:
Straight up or down without a break
Synonyms:
perpendicularly; sheer
Classified under:
Context examples:
However, the sheer number of what the scientists think were doomed octopuses and their eggs suggests that there's a better habitat nearby.
(Giant group of octopus moms discovered in the deep sea, National Science Foundation)
He had remained on that three-foot path, with sheer wall on one side and sheer drop on the other, until his enemy had overtaken him.
(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
In your picturesque account of the matter, which I read with great interest some months later, you assert that the wall was sheer.
(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
A sheer wall of rock had appeared before us, with no chink through which a mouse could have slipped.
(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
In a school carried on by sheer cruelty, whether it is presided over by a dunce or not, there is not likely to be much learnt.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
She lays close to the Endymion, between her and the Cleopatra, just to the eastward of the sheer hulk.”
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
It was sheer frenzy of this sort which made him throw his hands up into the air when his father, at their last interview, was goading him on to propose to Miss Turner.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Towards this garden the window of the sitting-room fronted, and from it, according to Mortimer Tregennis, must have come that thing of evil which had by sheer horror in a single instant blasted their minds.
(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
There appear to be locations along the canyon’s length where sheer cliffs reaching several miles high occur, and which could potentially rival Verona Rupes on Uranus’ moon Miranda (which is at least 3 miles, or 5 kilometers, high) for the title of tallest known cliff face in the solar system.
(A ‘Super Grand Canyon’ on Pluto’s Moon Charon, NASA)
The whole Company, leading their horses, passed across to the small hill which loomed in front of them out of the mist. It was indeed admirably designed for defence, for it sloped down in front, all jagged and boulder-strewn, while it fell away in a sheer cliff of a hundred feet or more.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
