Meanings
plural landslips · alternative land-slip
- The sliding of a mass of land down a cliff or slope; a landslide.
The embankments forming the lineside forest are also a cause for concern, as landslips can block the line for days or even weeks.
2019 October, Ian Walmsley, “Cleaning up”, in Modern Railways, page 424 more examples
This landslip appears to have been occasioned by the freezing of the springs in the chasms of the hill; the expansive force of the ice causing a separation at the base of the cliff beneath the hill, the ground began to move forward, and the lands of the farm, being pressed on by the descending mass, were torn from their original foundations.
1808, William Bernard Cooke, “Natural History”, in A New Picture of the Isle of Wight, London: Vernor, Hood & Sharpe, page 39And wasn’t it a sight to see, / When, ere his song was ended, / Like some great landslip, tree by tree, / The country-side descended;
1842, Alfred Tennyson, “Amphio”, in Poems. […], volume II, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 167Though a cliff, or sheet of bare rock, is hardly visible among the glens, yet here and there a bright brown patch tells of a recent landslip; […]
1871, Charles Kingsley, “Down the Islands”, in At Last: A Christmas in the West Indies. […], volume I, London; New York, N.Y.: Macmillan and Co., →OCLC, page 64Then some huge landslip in the thawing air had caught us, and spluttering expostulation, we began to roll down a slope, rolling faster and faster, leaping crevasses and rebounding from banks, faster and faster, westward into the white-hot boiling tumult of the lunar day.
1900 December – 1901 August, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, chapter VII, in The First Men in the Moon, London: George Newnes, […], published 1901, →OCLC
Synonyms & antonyms
Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.
Origin
Translations
German Erdrutsch
- Erdrutschsliding of a mass of land down a cliff or slope
Italian smottamento
- smottamentosliding of a mass of land down a cliff or slope
Māori horo, horowhenua
- horosliding of a mass of land down a cliff or slope
- horowhenuasliding of a mass of land down a cliff or slope
Polish osuwisko, obryw
- osuwiskosliding of a mass of land down a cliff or slope
- obrywsliding of a mass of land down a cliff or slope
Cite this entry
landslip. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/landslip
“landslip.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/landslip. Accessed November 2, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “landslip,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/landslip.
Source: landslip on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.