E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
Slewed.
Intoxicated When a vessel changes her tack, she staggers and gradually heels over. A drunken man moves like a ship changing her angle of sailing. (Probably from the Icelandic, snua, turn.)
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“Mr. Hornby was just a bit slewed by the liquor he’d taken.”—W. C. Russell: A Strange Voyage, chap. xii. p. 25.
