slit
/ˈslɪt/
slit noun: a narrow cut or opening; a slot.
Noun
slit (plural slits)
- A narrow cut or opening; a slot.
- The face which emerged was not reassuring. It was blunt and grey, the nose springing thick and flat from high on the frontal bone of the forehead, whilst his eyes were narrow slits of dark in a tight bandage of tissue.[…].1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 17, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC
- The vulva.
- […]I twiſted my thighs, ſqueezed, and compreſs’d the lips of that virgin-ſlit[…]1749, [John Cleland], “[Letter the First]”, in Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure [Fanny Hill], volume I, London: […] [Thomas Parker] for G. Fenton [i.e., Fenton and Ralph Griffiths] […], →OCLC, pages...
- A woman, usually a sexually loose woman; a prostitute.
Verb
slit (third-person singular simple present slits, present participle slitting, simple past slit, past participle slit or (obsolete) slitten)
- To cut a narrow opening.
- He slit the bag open and the rice began pouring out.
- To split into strips by lengthwise cuts.
- To cut; to sever; to divide.
- And slits the thin-spun life.1637 (date written; published 1638), John Milton, “Lycidas”, in Poems of Mr. John Milton, […], London: […] Ruth Raworth for Humphrey Mosely, […], published 1646, →OCLC
Adjective
slit (not comparable)
- Having a cut narrow opening.
slit meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Telugu
slit in Tamil
- கீறு, சிறு பிழை, சிறு வெடிப்பு, பிளப்பு, பிளப்புண்டாக்கு, சிறுபிளவு
slit in Urdu
- چاک, پھٹا, جھری, شگاف, چاک کرنا
slit in Bengali
- slit
- চেরা cera
slit in Telugu
- a slit
- చీలిక cīlika
More languagesFewer languages
- slit in Malayalam
- പിളർപ്പ്, നീണ്ട പിളർപ്പ്, കീറൽ, സ്ഖദനം
- slit in Kannada
- ಕೊಯ್ತ, ಸೀಳು, ಸೀಳುಗಂಡಿ, ಸೀಳುಕಂಡಿ
- slit in Punjabi
- ਚੀਰ cīr, ਝਿਰੀ jhirī
- slit in Sanskrit
- रन्ध्र rándhra
- slit in Assamese
- ফলা phola, ফালা phala
- slit in Nepali
- स्लिट गर्नुहोस्, स्लिट
- slit in Pashto
- کښت kux̌t
- slit in Arabic
- قَطَعَ qaṭaʕa, شَطَبَ šaṭaba, شَرَطَ šaraṭa
- slit in Indonesian
- mengiris
Examples of slit in a sentence
- He stepped in front of me, narrowing his eyes to slits.
- There was a series of windowlike slits in the castle wall.
- Push the snipped end of the piping bag through each slit into the bun.
Forms of slit
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | slits |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | slits |
| present participle | slitting |
| past | slit |
| past participle | slit |
| past participle (obsolete) | slitten |
Origin of slit
From Middle English slitten, from Old English slītan, from Proto-Germanic *slītaną (“to tear apart”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)leyd- (“to tear, rend (cut apart), split apart”). Possibly cognate with Latin laed- (“to strike, hurt, injure”). Doublet of slite; also related to slice through French borrowing. Apparently unrelated to English slot, whose etymology, however, is uncertain.
Words formed from slit
- arrowslit
- arrow slit
- dorsal slit
- double-slit experiment
- eyeslit
- gill slit
- microslit
- nanoslit
- piss-slit
- piss slit
- preslit
- slit drum
- slit-eyed
- slit-faced bat
- slit gong
- slit-gong
- slit lamp
- slitless
- slitlet
- slitlike
- slitmask
- slitmouth
- slit-scan
- slitshell
- slit-shell
- slittable
- slitted
- slitter
- slit trench
- slitty
- slitwidth
- slitwise
- unslit
- slit one's throat
- slit someone's throat
Phrases with slit
Words that rhyme with slit
48 more rhymesFewer rhymes
Questions about slit
- What does slit mean?
- Slit means a narrow cut or opening; a slot.
- What is slit in Tamil?
- Slit in Tamil is கீறு, சிறு பிழை, சிறு வெடிப்பு. See Slit meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is slit?
- Slit can be a noun, a verb or an adjective.
- How do you pronounce slit?
- Slit is pronounced /ˈslɪt/.
- What is the plural of slit?
- The plural of slit is slits.
Words near slit in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: slit (page history and authors); slit (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); slit (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); চেরা (Bengali) (page history and authors); చీలిక (Telugu) (page history and authors); slit (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); slit (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ਚੀਰ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); रन्ध्र (Sanskrit) (page history and authors); ফলা (Assamese) (page history and authors); slit (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); کښت (Pashto) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-slit.ogg.
Cite this entry: “slit.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/slit. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.