[syn: lean, skimpy]
4. not profitable or prosperous;
- Example: "a lean year"
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Lean \Lean\ (l[=e]n), v. t. [Icel. leyna; akin to G. l[aum]ugnen
to deny, AS. l[=y]gnian, also E. lie to speak falsely.]
To conceal. [Obs.] --Ray.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Lean \Lean\ (l[=e]n), v. i. [imp. & p. p. Leaned (l[=e]nd),
sometimes Leant (l[e^]nt); p. pr. & vb. n. Leaning.] [OE.
lenen, AS. hlinian, hleonian, v. i.; akin to OS. hlin[=o]n,
D. leunen, OHG. hlin[=e]n, lin[=e]n, G. lehnen, L. inclinare,
Gr. kli`nein, L. clivus hill, slope. [root]40. Cf.
Declivity, Climax, Incline, Ladder.]
1. To incline, deviate, or bend, from a vertical position; to
be in a position thus inclining or deviating; as, she
leaned out at the window; a leaning column. "He leant
forward." --Dickens.
[1913 Webster]
2. To incline in opinion or desire; to conform in conduct; --
with to, toward, etc.
[1913 Webster]
They delight rather to lean to their old customs.
--Spenser.
[1913 Webster]
3. To rest or rely, for support, comfort, and the like; --
with on, upon, or against.
[1913 Webster]
He leaned not on his fathers but himself.
--Tennyson.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Lean \Lean\, n.
1. That part of flesh which consists principally of muscle
without the fat.
[1913 Webster]
The fat was so white and the lean was so ruddy.
--Goldsmith.
[1913 Webster]
2. (Typog.) Unremunerative copy or work.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Lean \Lean\, v. t. [From Lean, v. i.; AS. hl[=ae]nan, v. t.,
fr. hleonian, hlinian, v. i.]
To cause to lean; to incline; to support or rest. --Mrs.
Browning.
[1913 Webster]
His fainting limbs against an oak he leant. --Dryden.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Lean \Lean\ (l[=e]n), a. [Compar. Leaner (l[=e]n"[~e]r);
superl. Leanest.] [OE. lene, AS. hl[=ae]ne; prob. akin to
E. lean to incline. See Lean, v. i. ]
1. Wanting flesh; destitute of or deficient in fat; slim; not
plump; slender; meager; thin; lank; as, a lean body; a
lean cattle.
[1913 Webster]
2. Wanting fullness, richness, sufficiency, or
productiveness; deficient in quality or contents; slender;
scant; barren; bare; mean; -- used literally and
figuratively; as, the lean harvest; a lean purse; a lean
discourse; lean wages. "No lean wardrobe." --Shak.
[1913 Webster]
Their lean and flashy songs. --Milton.
[1913 Webster]
What the land is, whether it be fat or lean. --Num.
xiii. 20.
[1913 Webster]
Out of my lean and low ability
I'll lend you something. --Shak.
[1913 Webster]
3. (Typog.) Of a character which prevents the compositor from
earning the usual wages; -- opposed to fat; as, lean
copy, matter, or type.
[1913 Webster]
Syn: slender; spare; thin; meager; lank; skinny; gaunt.
[1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):
lean
adj 1: lacking excess flesh; "you can't be too rich or too
thin"; "Yon Cassius has a lean and hungry
look"-Shakespeare [syn: thin, lean] [ant: fat]
2: lacking in mineral content or combustible material; "lean
ore"; "lean fuel" [ant: rich]
3: containing little excess; "a lean budget"; "a skimpy
allowance" [syn: lean, skimpy]
4: not profitable or prosperous; "a lean year"
n 1: the property possessed by a line or surface that departs
from the vertical; "the tower had a pronounced tilt"; "the
ship developed a list to starboard"; "he walked with a
heavy inclination to the right" [syn: tilt, list,
inclination, lean, leaning]
v 1: to incline or bend from a vertical position; "She leaned
over the banister" [syn: lean, tilt, tip, slant,
angle]
2: cause to lean or incline; "He leaned his rifle against the
wall"
3: have a tendency or disposition to do or be something; be
inclined; "She tends to be nervous before her lectures";
"These dresses run small"; "He inclined to corpulence" [syn:
tend, be given, lean, incline, run]
4: rely on for support; "We can lean on this man"
5: cause to lean to the side; "Erosion listed the old tree"
[syn: list, lean]
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:
242 Moby Thesaurus words for "lean":
Lenten, Spartan, abstemious, acquiesce, agree, angular, angularity,
arid, ascend, ascetic, austere, bad, bald, bank, bare, barren,
be agreeable to, be dying to, be eager, be game, be open to,
be ready, be spoiling for, be willing, believe in, bend, bend to,
bias, bony, candid, cant, careen, climb, collaborate, common,
commonplace, conduce, consent, contribute, cooperate, count on,
cow, curve, decline, deflect, depend on, descend, destitute,
difficult, dip, direct, dispose, divert, drop, dry, dull, dwarfed,
dwarfish, emaciated, endanger, exiguous, fall, fall away, fall off,
favor, flat, flat-chested, fleshless, frank, frighten, frugal,
gangling, gangly, gaunt, gawky, go, go along with, go downhill,
go uphill, grade, gradient, gravitate, haggard, hard,
have a tendency, head, heel, homely, homespun, imperil,
impoverished, inclination, incline, indigent, infertile,
intimidate, jejune, keel, lank, lanky, lead, lean on, lean towards,
lean-fleshed, lean-looking, leaning, leaning tower, limited, list,
look, look kindly upon, look to, matter-of-fact, meager, mean,
menace, miserly, narrow, natural, neat, necessitous, needy,
niggardly, not hesitate to, open, paltry, parsimonious, penurious,
pinched, pitch, plain, plain-speaking, plain-spoken, plunge,
plunge into, point, point to, poor, poverty-stricken, precipitate,
prefer, pressure, prosaic, prosing, prosy, puny, pure, rake, rangy,
rawboned, recline, redound to, rely on, retreat, rightful, rise,
rustic, scant, scanty, scare, scraggy, scrawny, scrimp, scrimpy,
serve, set, set toward, settle, severe, sheer, shelve,
show a tendency, shrunken, sidle, simple, simple-speaking, sink,
skeletal, skimp, skimpy, skinny, slant, slender, slight, slim,
slope, small, sober, spare, sparing, sparse, spidery, spindling,
spindly, stark, starvation, stingy, stinted, straightforward,
straitened, stunted, subside, subsistence, swag, sway, tend,
tend to go, terrify, terrorize, thin, thin-bellied, thin-fleshed,
threaten, tilt, tip, tower of Pisa, trend, trust in, turn, twiggy,
unadorned, unaffected, undersized, underweight, unfruitful,
unimaginative, unnourishing, unnutritious, unpoetical,
unproductive, unvarnished, uprise, verge, warn, warp, wasted,
watered, watery, wiry, work toward, would as leave,
would as lief
The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (30 December 2018):
Lean
An experimental language from the University of Nijmegen and
University of East Anglia, based on graph rewriting and
useful as an intermediate language. Lean is descended from
Dactl0.
Clean is a subset of Lean.
["Towards an Intermediate Language Based on Graph Rewriting",
H.P. Barendregt et al in PARLE: Parallel Architectures and
Languages Europe, G. Goos ed, LNCS 259, Springer 1987,
pp.159-175].
(1995-01-25)