• enPR: slīm, IPA: /slaɪm/

slime

1. Soft, moist earth or clay, having an adhesive quality; viscous mud; any substance of a dirty nature, that is moist, soft, and adhesive; bitumen; mud containing metallic ore, obtained in the preparatory dressing.
   • c. 1606–1607, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Anthonie and Cleopatra”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358 ↗, [Act II, scene vii]:

     As it [the Nile] ebbs, the seedsman / Upon the slime and ooze scatters his grain.

2. Any mucilaginous substance; or a mucus-like substance which exudes from the bodies of certain animals, such as snails or slugs.
3. (informal, derogatory) A sneaky, unethical person; a slimeball.
   • 2005, G. E. Nordell, Backlot Requiem: A Rick Walker Mystery

     If this guy knows who killed Robert, the right thing to do is to tell the police. If he doesn't know, really, then he's an opportunistic slime. It's still blackmail.

4. (video games) A monster having the form of a slimy blob.
5. (figuratively, obsolete) Human flesh, seen disparagingly; mere human form.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Qveene. […], London: Printed [by John Wolfe] for VVilliam Ponsonbie, OCLC 960102938 ↗, book II, canto X:

     {...}} th'eternall Lord in fleshly slime / Enwombed was, from wretched Adams line / To purge away the guilt of sinfull crime {{...}

6. (obsolete) Jew's slime (bitumen)
   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), imprinted at London: By Robert Barker, […], OCLC 964384981 ↗, Genesis 11:3 ↗:

     And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter.

7. (slang) friend, homie

• (any substance of a dirty nature) sludge

• Italian: melma, fanghiglia
• Russian: жижа
• Spanish: limo, cieno, lama, légamo

• French: glaire, bave (for a mollusc ; lit. "drool")
• German: Schleim
• Italian: poltiglia
• Portuguese: gosma, lodo
• Russian: слизь
• Spanish: baba, moco

slime (slimes, present participle sliming; past and past participle slimed)

1. (transitive) To coat with slime.
2. (transitive, figuratively) To besmirch or disparage.
3. To carve (fish), removing the offal.