Sample sentences for PRECIPITOUS

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Definition

done with very great haste and without due deliberation

or:

very steep

More rarely, precipitous may mean characterized by precipices (steep cliffs); or extremely steep.

By August 19, he was dead. There has been a great deal of conjecture about what caused such a precipitous decline.
Jon Krakauer -- Into the Wild

precipitous = fast

Slopes rose precipitously from the water's edge, bearded in a gloom of hemlock and cedar and devil's club.
Jon Krakauer -- Into the Wild

precipitously = steeply

He stayed there for ten days, until high winds forced him to seek refuge in a cave midway up the precipitous face of the bluff, where he remained for another ten days.
Jon Krakauer -- Into the Wild

precipitous = steep

"There was a moment when Marion's blood pressure dropped precipitously.
Abraham Verghese -- Cutting for Stone
She swam out farther and paused where the floor dropped precipitously into deepest blue.
Dave Eggers -- A Hologram for the King
The mountains were more precipitous now than ever before.
Betty Mahmoody -- Not Without My Daughter
The woods ran to the river in deep gullies, which dropped precipitously and cut across the road.
Boris Pasternak -- Doctor Zhivago
Now she was racing headlong down a precipitous grade where any misplaced step could mean a deadly fall.
Dan Brown -- Angels & Demons
Their excitement was not his; he felt as if he'd moved too precipitously.
Junot Diaz -- Drown
Still he went on, for his mind was as utterly narrowed into that precipitous crevice of play as if he had been the most ignorant lounger there.
George Eliot -- Middlemarch
Within a week after the receipt of this letter their little household fell precipitously to pieces.
F. Scott Fitzgerald -- This Side of Paradise
Together we made our way down the precipitous slope and approached the body, black and clear against the silvered stones.
Arthur Conan Doyle -- The Hound of the Baskervilles
He descended into a ravine which became precipitous.
Zane Grey -- The Heritage of the Desert
Climbing the precipitous ascent, he laughed and chattered, but she was silent, seeming to brood over something.
D.H. Lawrence -- Sons and Lovers
So precipitous was his move that he caught her off guard.
Milan Kundera -- The Unbearable Lightness of Being
1) Of insolence is bred The tyrant; insolence full blown, With empty riches surfeited, Scales the precipitous height and grasps the throne.
Sophocles -- Oedipus the King
Business began to suffer, at first gradually, then precipitously.
Warren St. John -- Outcasts United
I recognise the characteristic outline of the Dolbenberg, a jagged comb, springing up precipitously from the limits of the forests.
Erich Maria Remarque -- All Quiet on the Western Front
The hill offered commanding views, and the slopes were precipitous to the north and west and only slightly more gentle to the east.
George R.R. Martin -- A Clash of Kings
From a high in 1990, the crime rate went into precipitous decline.
Malcolm Gladwell -- The Tipping Point

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