landslip

From land +‎ slip.

landslip (plural landslips)

1. The sliding of a mass of land down a cliff or slope; a landslide.
   • 1808, William Bernard Cooke, “Natural History”, in A New Picture of the Isle of Wight‎^[1], London: Vernor, Hood & Sharpe, page 39:

     This landslip appears to have been occasioned by the freezing of the springs in the chasms of the hill; the expansive force of the ice causing a separation at the base of the cliff beneath the hill, the ground began to move forward, and the lands of the farm, being pressed on by the descending mass, were torn from their original foundations.

   • 1842, Alfred Tennyson, “Amphio”, in Poems. […], volume II, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 167:

     And wasn’t it a sight to see, / When, ere his song was ended, / Like some great landslip, tree by tree, / The country-side descended;

   • 1871, Charles Kingsley, “Down the Islands”, in At Last: A Christmas in the West Indies. […], volume I, London; New York, N.Y.: Macmillan and Co., →OCLC, page 64:

     Though a cliff, or sheet of bare rock, is hardly visible among the glens, yet here and there a bright brown patch tells of a recent landslip; […]

   • 1900 December – 1901 August, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, chapter VII, in The First Men in the Moon, London: George Newnes, […], published 1901, →OCLC:

     Then some huge landslip in the thawing air had caught us, and spluttering expostulation, we began to roll down a slope, rolling faster and faster, leaping crevasses and rebounding from banks, faster and faster, westward into the white-hot boiling tumult of the lunar day.

   • 2019 October, Ian Walmsley, “Cleaning up”, in Modern Railways, page 42:

     The embankments forming the lineside forest are also a cause for concern, as landslips can block the line for days or even weeks.

• land-slip