sheer

adj

Etymology: 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”).

1. Very thin or transparent.

   “Her light, sheer dress caught everyone’s attention.”

   ““She sheathed her legs in the sheerest of the nylons that her father had brought back from the Continent, and slipped her feet into the toeless, high-heeled shoes of black suède.””

2. 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.”

   “Thou sheer, immaculate and silver fountain, / From when this stream through muddy passages / Hath held his current and defiled himself!”

3. Downright; complete; pure.

   “I think it is sheer genius to invent such a thing.”

   “This poem is sheer nonsense.”

4. Used to emphasize the amount or degree of something.

   “The army's sheer size made it impossible to resist.”

   “Perhaps as startling as the sheer toll was the devastation to some of the state’s well-known locales. Boardwalks along the beach in Seaside Heights, Belmar and other towns on the Jersey Shore were blown away. Amusement parks, arcades and restaurants all but vanished. Bridges to barrier islands buckled, preventing residents from even inspecting the damage to their property.”

5. Very steep; almost vertical or perpendicular.

   “It was a sheer drop of 180 feet.”

adv

Etymology: 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”).

1. Clean; completely; at once.

   “Hector the ashen lance of Ajax smote / With his broad faulchion, at the nether end, / And lopp’d it sheer.”

   “Swift into the dark stream at once he fell, / As the red star at once falls swift and sheer / From sky to sea”

name

1. A surname.

noun

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

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

verb

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

1. To swerve from a course.

   “I sheered her well inshore—the water being deepest near the bank, as the sounding–pole informed me.”

   “Seydlitz correctly identifies the larger shell splashes as coming from the two "large light cruisers" at the rear, and takes aim. Moments later, Courageous sheers out of line, smoke and steam venting through a massive hole in her side, the shells having blasted right through whatever excuse for armor was present and detonated amidst the boiler rooms. She is doomed.”

2. Obsolete spelling of shear.

   “So thick, our navy scarce could sheer their way”