slepkava

An old compound, from the stem of slepens (“secret”) or slepus (“secretly, stealthily”), and the stem of kaut (“to slaughter, to kill in battle”), nominalized in the sense of 'slaughterer', 'killer'.^[1]

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slepkava m or f (4th declension)

1. killer, murderer (a person who has committed murder, who has illegally killed someone)

   pēc nožņaugšanas slepkava atstājis līķi turpat ratos ― after strangulation the murderer left a dead body right there, in the horse-drawn carriage

   redzot, ka esesietis nošauj cilvēku no koncentrācijas nometnes, kautrīgais, bērnišķīgais Vīze naidā metas uz slepkavu ― seeing that the SS's shot people from the concentration camp, the shy, childish Vīze in hatred threw himself on the murderer

2. (by extension) a hitman

The term slepkava is ambigenous. It is masculine when it refers to males and feminine when it refers to females. It is, however, always declined as a feminine noun, with the exception of its dative singular form, which is slepkavam when it refers to a male and slepkavai when it refers to a female.

• slepkavība
• slepkavīgs
• slepkavot

• slepens
• slēpt
• slepus, slēpu