Adjacent Words

Chasm definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

CHASM, n.
1. A cleft; a fissure; a gap; properly, an opening made by disrupture, as a beach in the earth or a rock.
2. A void space; a vacuity.
Between the two propositions, that the gospel is true and that it is false, what a fearful chasm! The unsettled reason hovers over it in dismay.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

n
1: a deep opening in the earth's surface

Merriam Webster's

noun Etymology: Latin chasma, from Greek; akin to Latin hiare to yawn — more at yawn Date: 1596 1. a deep cleft in the surface of a planet (as the earth) ; gorge 2. a marked division, separation, or difference

Oxford Reference Dictionary

n. 1 a deep fissure or opening in the earth, rock, etc. 2 a wide difference of feeling, interests, etc.; a gulf. 3 archaic a hiatus. Derivatives: chasmic adj. Etymology: L chasma f. Gk khasma gaping hollow

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Chasm Chasm, n. [L. chasma, Gr. ?, fr. ? to grape, to open wide. See Chaos.] 1. A deep opening made by disruption, as a breach in the earth or a rock; a yawning abyss; a cleft; a fissure. That deep, romantic chasm which slanted down the green hill. --Coleridge. 2. A void space; a gap or break, as in ranks of men. Memory . . . fills up the chasms of thought. --Addison.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(chasms) 1. A chasm is a very deep crack in rock, earth, or ice. N-COUNT 2. If you say that there is a chasm between two things or between two groups of people, you mean that there is a very large difference between them. ...the chasm that divides the worlds of university and industry. ...the chasm between rich and poor in America. = gulf, gap N-COUNT: usu with supp, oft N between pl-n

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

n. Opening, cleft, fissure, gap, hiatus, cavity, hollow.

Moby Thesaurus

abysm, abyss, aperture, arroyo, blank, box canyon, breach, break, broaching, canyon, cavity, chap, check, chimney, chink, clearing, cleavage, cleft, cleuch, clough, clove, col, coulee, couloir, crack, cranny, crater, crevasse, crevice, cut, cwm, deep, defile, dell, depth, dig, diggings, dike, disclosure, ditch, donga, draw, excavation, fault, fenestra, fissure, fistula, flaw, flume, fontanel, foramen, fracture, furrow, gap, gape, gash, gat, gorge, groove, gulch, gulf, gully, hiatus, hole, hollow, incision, inlet, interval, joint, kloof, lacuna, laying open, leak, mine, moat, notch, nullah, opening, opening up, orifice, outlet, overlook, oversight, pass, passage, passageway, pit, pore, preterition, quarry, ravine, rent, rift, rime, rupture, scissure, seam, shaft, skip, slit, slot, space, split, stoma, throwing open, trench, uncorking, unstopping, valley, void, wadi, well, workings, yawn, yawning abyss