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Descending   /dɪsˈɛndɪŋ/   Listen
verb
Descend  v. t.  To go down upon or along; to pass from a higher to a lower part of; as, they descended the river in boats; to descend a ladder. "But never tears his cheek descended."


Descend  v. i.  (past & past part. descended; pres. part. descending)  
1.
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 opposite of ascend. "The rain descended, and the floods came." "We will here descend to matters of later date."
2.
To enter mentally; to retire. (Poetic) "(He) with holiest meditations fed, Into himself descended."
3.
To make an attack, or incursion, as if from a vantage ground; to come suddenly and with violence; with on or upon. "And on the suitors let thy wrath descend."
4.
To come down to a lower, less fortunate, humbler, less virtuous, or worse, state or station; to lower or abase one's self; as, he descended from his high estate.
5.
To pass from the more general or important to the particular or less important matters to be considered.
6.
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; as, the beggar may descend from a prince; a crown descends to the heir.
7.
(Anat.) To move toward the south, or to the southward.
8.
(Mus.) To fall in pitch; to pass from a higher to a lower tone.


adjective
Descending  adj.  Of or pertaining to descent; moving downwards.
Descending constellations or Descending signs (Astron.), those through which the planets descent toward the south.
Descending node (Astron.), that point in a planet's orbit where it intersects the ecliptic in passing southward.
Descending series (Math.), a series in which each term is numerically smaller than the preceding one; also, a series arranged according to descending powers of a quantity.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Descending" Quotes from Famous Books



... of 1856, I met with Mr. Christy accidentally in an omnibus at Havana. He had been in Cuba for some months, leading an adventurous life, visiting sugar-plantations, copper-mines, and coffee-estates, descending into caves, and botanizing in tropical jungles, cruising for a fortnight in an open boat among the coral-reefs, hunting turtles and manatis, and visiting all sorts of people from whom information was to be had, from foreign consuls and ...
— Anahuac • Edward Burnett Tylor
... the dark swarming crowds of the citizens. Her white banner waving, her white armour shining, it was little wonder that the throng that filled the streets received the Maid "as if they had seen God descending among them." "And they had good reason," says the Chronicle, "for they had suffered many disturbances, labours, and pains, and, what is worse, great doubt whether they ever should be delivered. But now all were comforted, as if the siege were over, by the divine ...
— Jeanne d'Arc - Her Life And Death • Mrs.(Margaret) Oliphant
... rough. O, shun me not, but hear me ere you go! God knows, I cannot force love as you do: My words shall be as spotless as my youth, Full of simplicity and naked truth. This sacrifice, whose sweet perfume descending From Venus' altar, to your footsteps bending, Doth testify that you exceed her far, To whom you offer, and whose nun you are. Why should you worship her? her you surpass As much as sparkling diamons flaring glass. A diamond set in lead his worth retains; ...
— Hero and Leander and Other Poems • Christopher Marlowe and George Chapman
... appeared to pour over her soul; wildly she cast around her eyes, and then more piercing became her shrieks, as she found herself gradually descending into what seemed to be a pit or well—only that it ...
— Wagner, the Wehr-Wolf • George W. M. Reynolds
... his feet enthusiastically, bringing his feet down on the floor with a force that seemed to jar the whole house. Fortunately there was a substantial rug between his descending number ...
— The Radio Boys in the Thousand Islands • J. W. Duffield


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