dyke vs slack

dyke

noun
  • Any navigable watercourse. 

  • An embankment formed by the creation of a ditch. 

  • A body of rock (usually igneous) originally filling a fissure but now often rising above the older stratum as it is eroded away. 

  • An earthwork raised to prevent inundation of low land by the sea or flooding rivers. 

  • A raised causeway. 

  • Any small body of water. 

  • Any fence or hedge. 

  • A beaver's dam. 

  • Any impediment, barrier, or difficulty. 

  • A long, narrow hollow dug from the ground to serve as a boundary marker. 

  • A lesbian, particularly one with masculine or butch traits or behavior. 

  • A non-heterosexual woman. 

  • Any watercourse. 

  • A long, narrow hollow dug from the ground to conduct water. 

  • A jetty; a pier. 

  • A place to urinate and defecate: an outhouse or lavatory. 

  • A fissure in a rock stratum filled with intrusive rock; a fault. 

  • A low embankment or stone wall serving as an enclosure and boundary marker. 

verb
  • To dig, particularly to create a ditch. 

  • To surround with a ditch, to entrench. 

  • To scour a watercourse. 

  • To steep [fibers] within a watercourse. 

  • To surround with a low dirt or stone wall. 

  • To raise a protective earthwork against a sea or river. 

slack

noun
  • A tidal marsh or shallow that periodically fills and drains. 

  • Unconditional listening attention given by client to patient. 

  • A temporary speed restriction where track maintenance or engineering work is being carried out at a particular place. 

  • The part of anything that hangs loose, having no strain upon it. 

  • Small coal; coal dust. 

  • A valley, or small, shallow dell. 

adj
  • Moderately warm. 

  • Vulgar; sexually explicit, especially in dancehall music. 

  • Not active or busy, successful, or violent. 

  • Excess; surplus to requirements. 

  • Lax; not tense; not firmly extended. 

  • Lacking diligence or care; not earnest or eager. 

  • Lax. 

  • Moderate in speed. 

  • Weak; not holding fast. 

verb
  • To slacken. 

  • To lose cohesion or solidity by a chemical combination with water; to slake. 

adv
  • Slackly. 

How often have the words dyke and slack occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )