An archaic or poetic form meaning aslant or obliquely; at an angle or in a slanting direction.
Related to askance and aslant, from Middle English, possibly influenced by Old Norse. The -ant ending may derive from similar directional adverbs, with the meaning shifting to describe both physical angles and metaphorical skepticism.
This word is nearly extinct in modern English, but it appears in medieval poetry and Scottish dialect—it's like finding a fossil of how English speakers once described angles and directions differently than we do today!
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