declension

  • 1Declension — De*clen sion, n. [Apparently corrupted fr. F. d[ e]clinaison, fr. L. declinatio, fr. declinare. See {Decline}, and cf. {Declination}.] 1. The act or the state of declining; declination; descent; slope. [1913 Webster] The declension of the land… …

    The Collaborative International Dictionary of English

  • 2declension — index curtailment, decrease, decrement, degradation, deterioration, rejection, relapse Burton s Legal Thesaurus. William C. Bur …

    Law dictionary

  • 3declension — mid 15c., ultimately from L. declinationem (nom. declinatio), noun of action from pp. stem of declinare (see DECLINE (Cf. decline)); perhaps via French; the form is irregular, and its history obscure [OED] …

    Etymology dictionary

  • 4declension — decline, decadence, *deterioration, degeneration, devolution Analogous words: decaying or decay, disintegration, crumbling (see corresponding verbs at DECAY): retrogressiveness or retrogression, regressiveness or regression (see corresponding… …

    New Dictionary of Synonyms

  • 5declension — ► NOUN 1) the variation of the form of a noun, pronoun, or adjective that identifies its grammatical case, number, and gender. 2) the class to which a noun or adjective is assigned according to this variation. ORIGIN from Old French decliner to… …

    English terms dictionary

  • 6declension — [dē klen′shən, diklen′shən] n. [ME declenson < OFr declinaison < L declinatio, a bending aside, inflection (< pp. of declinare: see DECLINE): ME form infl. by assoc. with L descensio, a descending: see DESCEND] 1. a bending or sloping… …

    English World dictionary

  • 7Declension — In linguistics, declension is the inflection of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and articles to indicate number (at least singular and plural), case (nominative or subjective, genitive or possessive, etc.), and gender. A declension is also a group… …

    Wikipedia

  • 8declension — /di klen sheuhn/, n. 1. Gram. a. the inflection of nouns, pronouns, and adjectives for categories such as case and number. b. the whole set of inflected forms of such a word, or the recital thereof in a fixed order. c. a class of such words… …

    Universalium

  • 9declension — noun /dɪˈklɛn.ʃən/ a) A way of categorizing nouns, pronouns, or adjectives according to the inflections they receive. In Latin, amicus belongs to the second declension. Most second declension nouns end in i in the genitive singular and um in the… …

    Wiktionary

  • 10declension — n. an adjective; noun; strong; weak declension * * * [dɪ klenʃ(ə)n] noun strong weak declension an adjective …

    Combinatory dictionary