cleft

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With his left hand he held a long stick, cleft at one end, and in the cleft was a letter Come here, Stomp," said Bessie, and as she spoke a wild hope shot across her heart like a meteor across the night: perhaps the letter was from John The dog obeyed her unwillingly enough, for evidently he did not like that Kafir; and when he saw that Stomp was well out of the way the Kafir himself followed.

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Definitions (28)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (5)

  1. verb A past tense and a past participle of cleave1.
  2. adjective Divided; split.
  3. adjective Botany Having indentations that extend about halfway to the center, as in certain leaves.

Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (17)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (3)

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Examples

  • With his left hand he held a long stick, cleft at one end, and in the cleft was a letter Come here, Stomp," said Bessie, and as she spoke a wild hope shot across her heart like a meteor across the night: perhaps the letter was from John The dog obeyed her unwillingly enough, for evidently he did not like that Kafir; and when he saw that Stomp was well out of the way the Kafir himself followed. —  Jess
  • The brink of the cleft is the height of a man above him. —  Eric Brighteyes
  • With his left hand he held a long stick, cleft at one end, and in the cleft was a letter. —  Jess
  • Inside the cleft was a second guidance mark, which pointed right up it with the tip somewhat elevated, as if the spot indicated were above the level of the ground. —  The Lost World
  • In the cleft was a kind of curious snow, dry like sand, creaking and binding together under foot -- amazingly like pounded ice. —  Bog-Myrtle and Peat Tales Chiefly of Galloway Gathered from the Years 1889 to 1895
 

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Cleft has been looked up 237 times, favorited 0 times, listed 23 times, and commented on twice.

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Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

fissure ·  cranny ·  gully ·  crevasse ·  cleave ·  crag ·  fjord ·  outcrop ·  chasm ·  declivity ·  gulch ·  ledge
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (3)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English, past participle of cleven, to split; see cleave1. N., from Middle English, alteration (influenced by cleft) of clift, from Old English geclyft; see gleubh- in Indo-European roots.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (2)

  1. Early modern English also clift, from Middle English clift, clyft, and erroneously clif (perhaps from Anglo-Saxon *clyft, not found; otherwise Scandinavian), = Dutch kluft = Old High German chluft, German kluft = Icelandic kluft = Norwegian kluft, klyft = Swedish klyft, klyfta = Danish klöft, a cleft, crack, etc.; from the verb: Anglo-Saxon cleófan = Dutch kloven, etc., cleave, split: see cleave, and cf. clove = clough.
  2. Pp. of cleave, v.
 

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/klɛft/
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