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Sheer

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sheer¹

  • /ʃɪə̯/ Australia, UK
  • /ʃɪː/ British, Southern, Standard
  • /ˈʃɪj.ə/ British, Southern, Standard
  • /ʃɪɚ/ US
  • /ʃɛː/
  • /ʃiə̯/ New Zealand
  • /ʃiɾ/ Scotland
  • /ʃiɹ/ Scotland

Sounds like Scheer, shear, share (cheer–chair merger) · Rhymes with -ɪə(ɹ)

Where it comes from

From Middle English shere, scheere, schere, skere, from Old English sċǣre (“pure, sheer; shining, clear”), from Proto-Germanic *skairiz; supplanted the semantically close shire (dialectal), from Middle English schyre, schire, shire, shir, from Old English sċīr (“clear, bright; brilliant, gleaming, shining, splendid, resplendent; pure”), beside which existed Middle English skyr, from Old Norse skírr (“pure, bright, clear”), both from Proto-Germanic *skīriz (“pure, sheer”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ḱeh₁y- (“luster, gloss, shadow”).

Cognate with Danish skær, German schier (“sheer”), German Low German schier (“sheer, pure, unadulterated”; “completely, almost”), Dutch schier (“almost”), Gothic 𐍃𐌺𐌴𐌹𐍂𐍃 (skeirs, “clear, lucid”). Outside Germanic, cognate to Albanian hir (“grace, beauty; goodwill”).

adjective sheerer · more sheer · sheerest · most sheer

  1. Very thin or transparent. Her light, sheer dress caught everyone’s attention.
  2. obsolete Pure in composition; unmixed; unadulterated. If she say I am not fourteen pence on the score for sheer ale, score me up for the lying’st knave in Christendom.
  3. broadly Downright; complete; pure. I think it is sheer genius to invent such a thing.
  4. Used to emphasize the amount or degree of something. The army's sheer size made it impossible to resist.
  5. Very steep; almost vertical or perpendicular. It was a sheer drop of 180 feet.

Similar: diaphanous, filmy, gauzy, gossamer, see-through, sheer

adverb more sheer · most sheer

  1. archaic Clean; completely; at once. Hector the ashen lance of Ajax smote / With his broad faulchion, at the nether end, / And lopp’d it sheer.

noun sheers

  1. A sheer curtain or fabric. Use sheers to maximize natural light.

sheer²

  • /ʃɪə̯/ Australia, UK
  • /ʃɪː/ British, Southern, Standard
  • /ˈʃɪj.ə/ British, Southern, Standard
  • /ʃɪɚ/ US
  • /ʃɛː/
  • /ʃiə̯/ New Zealand
  • /ʃiɾ/ Scotland
  • /ʃiɹ/ Scotland

Sounds like Scheer, shear, share (cheer–chair merger) · Rhymes with -ɪə(ɹ)

Where it comes from

Perhaps from Dutch scheren (“to move aside, skim”); see also shear.

noun sheers

  1. The curve of the main deck or gunwale from bow to stern.
  2. An abrupt swerve from the course of a ship.

verb sheers · sheering · sheered

  1. To swerve from a course. I sheered her well inshore—the water being deepest near the bank, as the sounding–pole informed me.
  2. obsolete Obsolete spelling of shear.shear So thick, our navy scarce could sheer their way

Sheer³

proper noun Sheers

  1. A surname.

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