sleuth

English

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /sluːθ/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /sluːθ/
• Rhymes: -uːθ

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Etymology 1

Clipping of sleuthhound.

Noun

sleuth (plural sleuths)

1. A detective.

   Synonyms: detective, gumshoe, investigator, dick, private eye

   • 1908, Edith Van Dyne (Frank L. Baum), Aunt Jane’s Nieces at Millville

     Do ye want me to become a sleuth, or engage detectives to track the objects of your erroneous philanthropy?

   • 2021 June 23, Carl Zimmer, quoting Michael Worobey, “Scientist Finds Early Virus Sequences That Had Been Mysteriously Deleted”, in The New York Times‎^[1], →ISSN:

     “This is a great piece of sleuth work for sure, and it significantly advances efforts to understand the origin of SARS-CoV-2,” said Michael Worobey, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona who was not involved in the study.

2. (archaic) A sleuthhound; a bloodhound.
3. (obsolete) An animal’s trail or track.

Derived terms

• sleuth dog
• sleuthhound

 

Translations

detective

• Arabic: جَاسُوس m (jāsūs), جَاسُوسَة f (jāsūsa)
• Bulgarian: детектив m (detektiv)
• Catalan: detectiu (ca) m
• Czech: detektiv (cs) m
• Dutch: speurder (nl) m, speurneus (nl) m, detective (nl) m, detectief m (informal), rechercheur (nl) m
• Finnish: etsivä (fi), yksityisetsivä (fi)
• French: détective (fr) m
• Georgian: მაძებარი (maʒebari)
• German: Schnüffler (de) m, Spürnase (de) f, Detektiv (de) m
• Greek: λαγωνικό (el) n (lagonikó)
• Hungarian: rendőrkopó (hu), kopó (hu), nyomozó (hu), detektív (hu)
• Indonesian: reserse (id), detektif (id)
• Italian: investigatore (it) m
• Norwegian: detektiv m
• Portuguese: detetive (pt) m
• Romanian: detectiv (ro) m, copoi (ro) m (slang)
• Russian: сы́щик (ru) m (sýščik), ище́йка (ru) f (iščéjka) (usually pejorative)
• Serbo-Croatian: detektiv (sh), tragač (sh)
• Spanish: detective (es) m
• Spanish: indagar (es)
• Swedish: deckare (sv), snok (sv) c, detektiv (sv)

bloodhound

• Bulgarian: ловджийско куче (lovdžijsko kuče)
• Catalan: rastrejador m
• Danish: blodhund c
• Dutch: bloedhond (nl) m
• Erzya: верьбине (veŕbińe)
• Esperanto: spurhundo
• Finnish: vihikoira (fi)
• French: limier (fr) m
• Georgian: მაძებარი ძაღლი (maʒebari ʒaɣli)
• German: Bluthund (de) m, Bluthündin f, Schweißhund (de) m, Schweißhündin f, (Swiss German) Schweisshund (de) m, Schweisshündin f, Bloodhound m, Spürhund (de) m
• Greek: λαγωνικό (el) n (lagonikó)
• Italian: segugio (it) m
• Kyrgyz: жойчу (ky) f (joycu)
• Malay:

  Jawi: انجيڠ ڤمبورو داره

  Rumi: anjing pemburu darah

• Manx: coo folley m
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: blodhund (no) m

  Nynorsk: blodhund (no) m

• Polish: ogar (pl)
• Portuguese: sabujo (pt) m
• Romanian: copoi (ro) m
• Russian: ище́йка (ru) f (iščéjka)
• Spanish: sabueso (es) m
• Swedish: blodhund (sv) c
• Volapük: bludadog (vo)

Verb

sleuth (third-person singular simple present sleuths, present participle sleuthing, simple past and past participle sleuthed)

1. (intransitive, transitive) To act as a detective; to try to discover who committed a crime, or, more generally, to solve a mystery.
   • 1922, Agatha Christie, The Secret Adversary:

     We must discover where he lives, what he does — sleuth him, in fact!

Synonyms

• shadow

Translations

act as a detective

• Czech: vyšetřovat (cs) impf
• Dutch: naspeuren (nl), schaduwen (nl)
• German: nachspüren (de), untersuchen (de), beschatten (de), schnüffeln (de)
• Italian: mettersi sulle tracce
• Russian: высле́живать (ru) (vysléživatʹ)
• Swedish: spana (sv), skugga (sv)

Etymology 2

From Old English slǣwþ, corresponding to slow + -th.

Noun

sleuth (plural sleuths)

1. (obsolete, uncountable) Slowness; laziness, sloth.

   Synonyms: idleness, inertia, laziness, lethargy, sloth, slothfulness

2. (rare, collective) A group of bears.

   Synonym: sloth

   • 1961, Noel Perrin, A Passport Secretly Green, page 89:

     As quietly as if I were practicing to join a sleuth of bears, I crept out the door and went on home, eventually winding up in the garage…

   • 1995, Bobbie Ann Mason, The Girl Sleuth, page 13:

     If these dainty adventurers weren’t being chased by a sleuth of bears or bogeys, they were being captured by Gypsies or thieves.

   • 2007, Elinor DeWire, The Lightkeepers’ Menagerie: Stories of Animals at Lighthouses, page 200:

     From the darkness came the howls of routs of wolves and bands of coyotes, the rumbling growls of a sleuth of bears or the bugles of a gang of elk.

See also

• sloth
• Appendix:Animals

Anagrams

• Hulets, Lesuth, Lueths, hustle