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more about declension
declension |
2 definitions found From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) [web1913]: Declension \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. The declension of the land from that place to the sea. --T. Burnet. 2. A falling off towards a worse state; a downward tendency; deterioration; decay; as the declension of virtue, of science, of a state, etc Seduced the pitch and height of all his thoughts To base declension. --Shak. 3. Act of courteously refusing; act of declining; a declinature; refusal; as the declension of a nomination. 4. (Gram.) a Inflection of nouns, adjectives, etc., according to the grammatical cases. b The form of the inflection of a word declined by cases; as the first or the second declension of nouns, adjectives, etc c Rehearsing a word as declined. Note: The nominative was held to be the primary and original form and was likened to a perpendicular line the variations, or oblique cases, were regarded as fallings (hence called casus, cases, or fallings) from the nominative or perpendicular; and an enumerating of the various forms, being a sort of progressive descent from the noun's upright form was called a declension. --Harris. {Declension of the needle}, declination of the needle. From WordNet r 1.6 [wn]: declension n 1: the inflection of nouns and pronouns and adjectives 2: the complete set of inflected forms of a noun or pronoun or adjective 3: a class of nouns having the same inflectional forms: "the first declension in Latin"
more about declension
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