rift

rift

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: rĭft, IPA^(key): /ɹɪft/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɪft

Etymology 1

Middle English rift, of North Germanic origin; akin to Danish rift, Norwegian Bokmål rift (“breach”), Old Norse rífa (“to tear”). More at rive.

Noun

rift (plural rifts)

1. A chasm or fissure.

   My marriage is in trouble: the fight created a rift between us and we can't reconnect.

   The Grand Canyon is a rift in the Earth's surface, but is smaller than some of the undersea ones.

2. A break in the clouds, fog, mist etc., which allows light through.
   • 1931, William Faulkner, Sanctuary, Vintage, published 1993, page 130:

     I have but one rift in the darkness, that is that I have injured no one save myself by my folly, and that the extent of that folly you will never learn.

3. A shallow place in a stream; a ford.

Derived terms

• rift valley

Translations

chasm or fissure

Bulgarian: цепнатина (bg) f (cepnatina) Chinese: Cantonese: 罅 (laa3) Danish: rift Dutch: breuk (nl) m Finnish: kuilu (fi), halkeama (fi), repeämä (fi) French: fente (fr), fissure (fr) German: Riss (de) m Greek: Ancient: χάσμα n (khásma) Macedonian: цепна́тина f (cepnátina), ра́сцеп m (ráscep), пукна́тина f (puknátina) Maori: tawhā Norwegian: rift Russian: тре́щина (ru) f (tréščina), разры́в (ru) m (razrýv), рассе́лина (ru) f (rassélina) Slovak: trhlina f Spanish: cisma (es), fisura (es)

break in the clouds, fog, mist etc.

Finnish: aukko (fi); valopilkku (fi) (figuratively) French: percée (fr), éclaircie (fr) Russian: просве́т (ru) m (prosvét)

shallow place in a stream — see ford

Verb

rift (third-person singular simple present rifts, present participle rifting, simple past and past participle rifted)

1. (intransitive) To form a rift; to split open.
2. (transitive) To cleave; to rive; to split.

   to rift an oak

   • 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act V, (please specify the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals)]:

     to the dread rattling thunder / Have I given fire and rifted Jove's stout oak / With his own bolt

   • 1822, William Wordsworth, A Jewish Family (in a small valley opposite St. Goar, upon the Rhine)‎, line 9-11:

     The Mother—her thou must have seen, / In spirit, ere she came / To dwell these rifted rocks between.

   • 1894, Ivan Dexter, Talmud: A Strange Narrative of Central Australia, published in serial form in Port Adelaide News and Lefevre's Peninsula Advertiser (SA), Chapter III,

     he stopped rigid as one petrified and gazed through the rifted logs of the raft into the water.

Etymology 2

From Old Norse rypta.

Verb

rift (third-person singular simple present rifts, present participle rifting, simple past and past participle rifted)

1. (obsolete outside Scotland and northern UK) To belch.

Verb

rift (obsolete)

1. past participle of rive

   The mightie trunck halfe rent, with ragged rift
   Doth roll adowne the rocks, and fall with fearefull drift.

Anagrams

• FTIR, frit

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French

Noun

rift m (plural rifts)

1. (geology) rift

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Norwegian Bokmål

Etymology

From the verb rive.

Noun

rift f or m (definite singular rifta or riften, indefinite plural rifter, definite plural riftene)

1. a rip, tear (in fabric)
2. a break (in the clouds)
3. a scratch (on skin, paint)
4. a rift (geology)

Derived terms

• riftdal

References

• “rift” in The Bokmål Dictionary.
• “rift” in Det Norske Akademis ordbok (NAOB).

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Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

From the verb rive or riva.

Noun

rift f (definite singular rifta, indefinite plural rifter, definite plural riftene)

1. a rip, tear (in fabric)
2. a break (in the clouds)
3. a scratch (on skin, paint)
4. a rift (geology)

Derived terms

• riftdal

References

• “rift” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

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Old English

Etymology

From Proto-Germanic *riftą, *riftiją, perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *h₁rebʰ- (“to cover; arch over; vault”). Cognate with Old High German peinrefta (“legwear; leggings”), Old Norse ript, ripti (“a kind of cloth; linen jerkin”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /rift/

Noun

rift n (nominative plural rift)

1. a veil; curtain; cloak

Related terms

• rifte

Descendants

• Middle English: rift

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Romanian

Etymology

From French rift.

Noun

rift n (plural rifturi)

1. rift

Declension

Declension of rift

	singular		plural
	indefinite articulation	definite articulation	indefinite articulation	definite articulation
nominative/accusative	(un) rift	riftul	(niște) rifturi	rifturile
genitive/dative	(unui) rift	riftului	(unor) rifturi	rifturilor
vocative	riftule		rifturilor

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Scots

Etymology

From Old Norse rypta.

Verb

rift (third-person singular simple present rifts, present participle riftin, simple past riftit, past participle riftit)

1. to belch, burp