sleuth

play

noun \ ˈslüth \

Definition of sleuth

:detective

See sleuth defined for English-language learners

See sleuth defined for kids

sleuth was our Word of the Day on 10/05/2013. Hear the podcast!

Examples of sleuth in a Sentence

the popular TV sleuth lives a much more action-packed life than do his real-world counterparts

Recent Examples of sleuth from the Web

But Alex Michael Ramos, 33, had a head start of nearly two weeks from the time internet sleuths identified him as a suspect in the attack, caught on video, that left counter-protester DeAndre Harris with a broken wrist and deep head wound.

— ajc homepage, ajc, "Marietta man wanted in Charlottesville assault remains at large," 28 Aug. 2017
As gang members and dealers post partying plans, the sleuths determine where to point their investigation.

— author: jan hoffman, Alaska Dispatch News, "Hunting a killer in Oklahoma: Sex, drugs and the return of syphilis," 25 Aug. 2017
This sort of thing has been happening for years—and the internet sleuths, as local news stories love to tag them, have often gone awry.

— alexis c. madrigal, The Atlantic, "Would You Doxx a Nazi?," 22 Aug. 2017
The tart-tongued kid is chief meteorologist Ted Pretty's son, as one internet sleuth named Luke O'Neil uncovered, and Pretty himself gamely confirmed.

— raisa bruner, Time, "This FOX Weather Reporter Got Unflinchingly Sassed By His Own Son On-Air," 29 June 2017
Neither of his leads in the Boston heist is new, but the tenacious sleuth hopes the bigger reward will help.

— mike corder, The Seattle Times, "Dutch sleuth hopes for breakthrough in biggest US art heist," 27 June 2017
How do cyber sleuths go about making security systems more secure? Infiltrate them.

— christina hall, Detroit Free Press, "Students put cybersecurity skills to the test in cybertruck challenge," 27 June 2017
So we are forced to be sleuths, decoding the slippery nuances of a language that belittles us and offers no obvious translation.

— nandi rose plunkett, Esquire, "Don't Call Me the Girl in the Band," 20 June 2017
Well, sure it’s possible, so long as the supine sleuth has friends like Bo, who digs up the police files for his old boss and drives him around to possible crime scenes.

— marilyn stasio, New York Times, "In a New Crime Lineup, a Supine Swede and Private Eyes With Bad Habits," 7 June 2017

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'sleuth.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Origin and Etymology of sleuth

short for sleuthhound

NEW! Time Traveler

First Known Use: 1872

See Words from the same year

sleuth Synonyms

Synonyms

dick, gumshoe, hawkshaw, investigator, operative, private detective, private eye, private investigator, shamus [slang], sherlock, detective, sleuthhound

Related Words

shadow, tail, tracer, tracker; fed, Federal, G-man, narc (or nark) [slang], plainclothesman

Other Legal Terms

actionable, alienable, carceral, chattel, complicity, decedent, larceny, malfeasance, modus operandi

sleuth

verb

Definition of sleuth

intransitive verb

:to act as a detective :search for information

transitive verb

:to search for and discover

Recent Examples of sleuth from the Web

Knight's mission was to sleuth out a new fossil site on a flank of the mountain that paleontologists hadn't yet explored.

— kate siber, Alaska Dispatch News, "When dinosaurs ruled Alaska," 19 Aug. 2017
The experts in the Good Housekeeping Institute Textiles, Papers and Plastics Lab tested out memory foam, down and more to sleuth out the best picks for every type of sleeper.

— the good housekeeping institute, Good Housekeeping, "The Best Pillows to Help You Sleep Like a Baby," 7 Aug. 2017
The greenback cutthroat rescue ramped up in 2012 when sleuthing by a University of Colorado team verified that the one true population of greenback cutthroat trout lives along a 3.5-mile stretch of Bear Creek southwest of Colorado Springs.

— bruce finley, The Denver Post, "Colorado’s rarest fish: greenback cutthroats endure electro-zapping, netting and squeezing as biologists try to save state fish from extinction," 13 June 2017
But a lucky devil gets to revel By sleuthing the perfect angle.

— pioneer press, Twin Cities, "2017 Pioneer Press Treasure Hunt clue 6," 26 Jan. 2017

Did You Know?

They were the footprints of a gigantic hound! Those canine tracks in Arthur Conan Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles set the great Sherlock Holmes sleuthing on the trail of a murderer. It was a case of art imitating etymology. When Middle English speakers first borrowed sleuth from Old Norse, the term referred to "the track of an animal or person." In Scotland, a sleuthhound was a bloodhound used to hunt game or track down fugitives from justice. In 19th century U.S. English, sleuthhound became an epithet for a detective and was soon shortened to sleuth. From there, it was only a short leap to turning sleuth into a verb describing what a sleuth does.