cleft

¹

[ kleft ]

noun

1. a space or opening made by cleavage; a split.

   Synonyms: crevasse, chasm, cranny, rift, crack, crevice, fissure

2. a division formed by cleaving. cleave.
3. a hollow area or indentation:

   a chin with a cleft.

4. Veterinary Pathology. a crack on the bend of the pastern of a horse.

cleft

²

[ kleft ]

verb

1. a simple past tense and past participle of cleave ².

adjective

1. cloven; cleave; cloven; split; divided.
2. (of a leaf, corolla, lobe, or other expanded plant part) having divisions formed by incisions or narrow sinuses that extend more than halfway to the midrib or the base.

cleft

/ klɛft /

verb

1. the past tense and a past participle of cleave 1

noun

1. a fissure or crevice
2. an indentation or split in something, such as the chin, palate, etc

adjective

1. split; divided
2. (of leaves) having one or more incisions reaching nearly to the midrib

Word History and Origins

Origin of cleft¹

1300–50; Middle English clift, Old English ( ge ) clyft split, cracked; cognate with Old High German, Old Norse kluft; akin to cleave ²

Origin of cleft²

cleft ¹

Word History and Origins

Origin of cleft¹

Old English geclyft (n); related to Old High German kluft tongs, German Kluft gap, fissure; see cleave ¹

Example Sentences

Treatable diagnoses, such as cleft lip, are distinct from diagnoses pertaining to severely disabled newborns.

From Time

Had the slope been mellower, Lewis could have hopped on one leg, but the route traveled through standing timber, around downed trees, across rocky clefts, and through small subalpine finger meadows.

From Outside Online

Messages pass between one cell and onto the next by floating across the space between — a gap called the synaptic cleft.

From Science News For Students

Like the Korean Peninsula, Illinois is cleft into two parts: Chicagoland and “downstate.”

From The Daily Beast

He pretended that it was five hundred years' journey from one to another, and that he cleft the moon in twain.

From Project Gutenberg

So I even told her how he had gone over the edge into the cleft, but without saying that we feared for his life for so long.

From Project Gutenberg

Thrice—De Valmont's guard shivered as a rush—through shield, hauberk, gorget cleft the Vikings' blade.

From Project Gutenberg

Point a pitying finger to the yawning abyss of shame, ruin, and despair that even now perhaps is being cleft under his feet.

From Project Gutenberg

But a single effective shot into the centre of the column had cleft it as a rock divides a torrent.

From Project Gutenberg