Other forms: sloths
A sloth is a famously slow animal that hangs from branches all day. A three-toed sloth, sloths in the canopy, slow as a sloth.
It moves slowly because its diet of leaves gives it almost no energy, and it digests a meal for weeks. Algae grow in its fur and give it a green tinge, which helps it hide. The word first meant laziness, one of the seven deadly sins, and the animal was named after it.
1nounslothA slow tree-dwelling animal of Central and South America.
“A sloth hung upside down from the branch, hardly moving at all.”
sloth is an animal.
Old English slaewth means laziness, from slaw, slow. The animal was named after the vice.
Proto-Germanic
*slaiwiþō — slowness, lateness
Proto-West Germanic
*slaiwiþu
Old English
slǣwþ — sloth, indolence, laziness, inertness, torpor
Middle English
slouthe
English, today
sloth
Built from
From Middle English slouthe, slewthe (“laziness”), from Old English slǣwþ (“sloth, indolence, laziness, inertness, torpor”), from Proto-West Germanic slaiwiþu, from Proto-Germanic slaiwiþō (“slowness, lateness”), equivalent to slow + th. Cognate with Scots sleuth (“sloth, slowness”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA