| English > English | |
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| descending | |
| 1. adj. (of a sequence) Ordered such that each element is less than or equal to the previous element. |  |
| Please arrange these numbers in a descending order. | |
| 2. adj. (computing) That causes a sequence to follow a descending order. | |
| We used a descending sort. | |
| 3. n. A descent. | |
| continual ascendings and descendings | |
| descend | |
| 1. v. (intransitive) To pass from a higher to a lower place; to move downwards; to come or go down in any way, as by falling, flowing, walking, etc.; to plunge; to fall; to incline downward | |
| The rain descended, and the floods came. | |
| 2. v. (intransitive, poetic) To enter mentally; to retire. | |
| 3. v. (intransitive, with on or upon) To make an attack, or incursion, as if from a vantage ground; to come suddenly and with violence. | |
| 4. v. (intransitive) To come down to a lower, less fortunate, humbler, less virtuous, or worse, state or station; to lower or abase oneself | |
| he descended from his high estate | |
| 5. v. (intransitive) To pass from the more general or important to the particular or less important matters to be considered. | |
| 6. v. (intransitive) To come down, as from a source, original, or stock; to be derived; to proceed by generation or by transmission; to fall or pass by inheritance. | |
| The beggar may descend from a prince. | |
| A crown descends to the heir. | |
| 7. v. (intransitive, astronomy) To move toward the south, or to the southward. | |
| 8. v. (intransitive, music) To fall in pitch; to pass from a higher to a lower tone. | |
| 9. v. To go down upon or along; to pass from a higher to a lower part of | |
| they descended the river in boats; to descend a ladder | |
