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slave Definition

slave (slāv)

noun

  1. a human being who is owned as property by, and is absolutely subject to the will of, another; bondservant divested of all freedom and personal rights
  2. a person who is completely dominated by some influence, habit, person, etc. a slave to fashion
  3. a person who slaves; drudge
  4. slave ant
  5. a device actuated or controlled by another, similar device

Etymology: ME sclave < OFr or ML: OFr esclave < ML sclavus, slave, orig., Slav < LGr Sklabos, ult. < OSlav Slovēne, native name of a Slavic people: first used of captives of Slavic orig. in SE Europe

intransitive verb slaved, slav′·ing

  1. to work like a slave; drudge
  2. to deal in slaves; be a slaver

transitive verb

Archaic to enslave

slave Synonyms

slave

modif.

vassal, captive, enslaved; see bound 1, 2, restricted.

slave Synonyms

slave

n.

  1. A person in bondage

    bondsman, bondservant, bondslave, thrall, chattel, serf, vassal, villein, captive, bondsmaid, bondwoman, victim of tyranny, one of a subject people.

  2. A drudge

    toiler, menial, worker; see drudge, laborer.

slave Usage Examples

Preposition: of

  • sin: And he says about us, you were slaves of sin.

Converse of object

  • emancipate: The emancipated slave is constructed as a powerful and striking figure.
  • escape: In it Paul is trying to save the life of an escaped slave without sounding too demanding to his owner.

Adjective modifier

  • runaway: Huck runs away from home and finds a runaway slave called Jim.
  • fugitive: In doing so, he meets with a fugitive slave named Jim.
  • African: Did you see the fight of the African slave?
  • Hebrew: The exodus of the Hebrew slaves from Egypt is not a victory or triumph of the same order as the resurrection.
  • obedient: Soon, she would be his totally obedient slave.
  • former: The point I stressed in my book is that Peter ended this sort of slavery by making former slaves subject to the poll tax.

Modifies a noun

  • trade: Maybe the old slave trade has been almost closed.
  • labor: Of these, 115,000 were deported to Poland for slave labor, and after departure all trace of them was lost.
  • trader: Europeans became slave traders largely by purchase from powerful African tribes.
  • revolt: In 1791 these Africans began the only successful national slave revolt in history.
  • labor: Massive fortifications were built with slave labor brought in from all over Europe.

Noun used with modifier

  • galley: A galley slave, for instance, has the privilege of stealing with impunity.
  • chattel: What an idiot I would be to make chattel slaves of them.
  • wage: What is a Virtual Assistant worth... From wage slave to home alone From wage slave to home alone.
  • sex: Why were they not raiding a drugs den or a human trafficking sex slave brothel instead?
  • plantation: On the plantations slaves lasted on average four years.
slave Quotes

English children have lost their innocence, for their first lessons have been in the exploitation of their adult slave.

—Greer, Germaine

Be not the slave of words.

—Carlyle,Thomas

The automatic machine, whatever we thinkof any feelings it may or may not have, is the precise economic equivalent of the slave.

—Wiener, Norbert

The worst your malice can, Is but to say the greatest of mankind Has been my slave. The next, but far above him In my esteem, is he whom law calls yours, But whom his love made mine.

—Dryden,John

O, the rare tricks of a Machiavellian! He doth not come, like a gross plodding slave, And buffet you to death; no, my quaint knave, He tickles you to death, makes you die laughing.

—Webster,John

   Slavery broke the world in half, it broke it in every way. It broke Europe.It madethem intosomething else, it made themslave masters, it madethem crazy.You can't dothat for hundreds of years and it not take a toll. They had to dehumanize, not just the slaves but themselves.

—Morrison,Toni Chloe Anthony ne¤  e Wofford

   La femme marie¤  e est un esclave qu'il faut savoir mettre sur un tro" n e. A married woman is a slave whom one must put on a throne.

—Balzac, Honore¤   de

My father was a slave, and my people died to build this country, and I am going to stay here and have a piece of it, just like you.

—Robeson, Paul

But ruffian stern, and soldier good, The noble and the slave, From various cause the same wild road, On the same bloody morning, trode, To that dark innöthe Grave!

—Scott, Sir Walter

'A house divided against itself cannot stand': I believe that this Government cannot endure permanently half- slave and half-free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved. I do not expect the house to fallöbut I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing, or all the other.

—Lincoln, Abraham

Physician art thou?öone, all eyes, Philosopher!öa fingering slave, One that would peep and botanize Upon his mother's grave?

—Wordsworth,William

L'esclave n'a qu'un ma|"tre; l'ambitieux en a autantqu'il ya des gens utiles a'   sa fortune. A slave has but one master; an ambitious person has as many as he needs to make his fortune.

—La Bruye'  re,Jean de

Herren-Moral und Sklaven-Moral. Master morality and slave morality.

—Nietzsche, FriedrichWilhelm

The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when theyare right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else.Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back. I am sure the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared with the gradual encroachment of ideas.

—Keynes (of Tilton),John Maynard, 1st Baron

You maydream freely whenyou listen tomusic as well as when you look at painting.When you read a book you are the slave of the author's mind.

—Gauguin, Paul

   Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.

—Humboldt, Alexander, Baron von

Slave to no sect, who takes no private road, But looks thro' Nature, up to Nature's God.

—Pope, Alexander

The root of Evil, Avarice That damn'd ill-natur'd, baneful Vice, Was Slave to Prodigality, That noble Sin; whilst Luxury Employed a Million of the Poor, And odious Pride a Million more; Envy itself, and Vanity, Were Ministers of Industry; Their darling Folly, Fickleness, In Diet, Furniture and Dress That strange ridic'lous Vice, was made That very Wheel that turned theTrade.

—Mandeville, Bernard

Men's actions are too strong for them. Show me a man who has acted, and who has not been the victim and slave of his action.

—Emerson, RalphWaldo

The worker is the slave of capitalist society, the female worker is the slave of that slave.

—Connolly,James

It appears toYour Majesty's slave that we are very deficient in means, and have not the shells and rockets used by the barbarians.We must, therefore, adopt other methods to stop them, which will be easy, as they have opened negotiations.

—Kishen   fl.c.1840