All 6 Uses of
descend
in
The Idiot
- Such a tile was about to descend upon the elegant and decorous public now assembled to hear the music.
Chpt 3.2 *descend = fall downward
- I don't know how Mrs. Epanchin comes into the Muishkin family, but she is descended from the Princess Muishkin, and she, too, is the last of her line.†
Chpt 1.1
- Gania having once descended to abuse, and receiving no check, very soon knew no bounds or limit to his licence, as is often the way in such cases.†
Chpt 1.7
- She had scarcely descended the terrace steps leading to the high road that skirts the park at Pavlofsk, when suddenly there dashed by a smart open carriage, drawn by a pair of beautiful white horses.†
Chpt 2.10
- In order to pass from the Vauxhall to the band-stand, the visitor has to descend two or three steps.†
Chpt 3.2
- No one else followed the eccentric lady; but as she descended the steps she did not even look behind her, as though it were absolutely the same to her whether anyone were following or not.†
Chpt 3.2
Definitions:
-
(1)
(descend as in: descend the mountain) move or slope downward
-
(2)
(descend as in: in descending order) move down a scale -- as from larger numbers to smaller, or higher notes to lower
-
(3)
(descend as in: descend from royalty) figuratively, to have come down a path from the past; i.e., to originate or come from -- such as in reference to ancestors or evolutionary origins
-
(4)
(descend as in: descend into poverty) figuratively, to move downward to a worse or less prestigious situation
-
(5)
(descend as in: descend into deeper thought) to move from a higher level of abstraction downward to a lower one (from more general to more specific); or to move from superficial to deeper thought
-
(6)
(descend as in: thieves descended upon us) to come or arrive -- especially suddenly or from above or as an attack