steep-down, a. Obs. exc. poet.
[f. steep a. + down adv. Cf. steep-up.]
Precipitous.
| 1530 Palsgr. 827/1 Stepe downe, tout bas en droycte lygne. 1545 Elyot Dict., Cliuosus,..pitching doune, or stiepe doune. 1560 Bible (Geneva) Matt. viii. 32 The whole herd of swine was caryed with violence from a stiepe downe place into the sea. 1584–7 Greene Carde of Fancie Wks. (Grosart) IV. 74 The cliffes so steep-downe and feareful, as to descend was no lesse daunger then death it selfe. 1604 Shakes. Oth. v. ii. 280 Whip me ye Diuels..: Wash me in steepe-downe gulfes of Liquid fire. 1648 J. Beaumont Psyche iii. xiv, You see Him till into the steep-down West He throws his course. 1828 Tennyson Lover's T. 390 Steep-down walls of battlemented rock. |
† b. Of a shower. Obs.
| 1601 W. Watson Import. Consid. (1831) 30 A steep-down shower of stormy sorrows. |