cleft See cleavecleft adj

1 used of hooves [syn: cloven, bisulcate]

2 having one or more incisions reaching nearly to the midrib [syn: dissected]

1 a split or indentation in something (as the palate or chin)

2 a long narrow opening [syn: crack, crevice, fissure, scissure]cleave

1 separate or cut with a tool, such as a sharp instrument; "cleave the bone" [syn: split, rive]

2 make by cutting into; "The water is going to cleave a channel into the rock"

3 come or be in close contact with; stick or hold together and resist separation; "The dress clings to her body"; "The label stuck to the box"; "The sushi rice grains cohere" [syn: cling, adhere, stick, cohere] [also: cloven, clove, cleft]

English

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ɛft

Noun

1. an opening, fissure, or V-shaped indentation made by or as if by splitting

Translations

• Chinese: 裂縫, 裂缝
• French: fissure
• German: Spalte
• Japanese: 裂け目
• Korean: 골 (gor, -l), 샅 (sat)
• Portuguese: rachadura , fissura , partido
• Russian: расселина (rasselina)
• Spanish: hendidura
• Turkish: yarık

Derived terms

• Cleft of Venus
• cleft chin
• cleft foot
• cleft lip
• cleft palate

Related terms

• cleave
• cleavage
• cleaver

See also

• dimple

Verb

cleft

1. past of cleave

Translations

• Dutch: gespleten
• Turkish: yarılmış from yarmak

Cleft may refer to the following:

• A cleft sentence, a type of grammatical construction
• Cleft lip and palate, a congenital deformity
• A cleft chin, a dimple on the chin
• The Cleft of venus as a part of the female genitalia
• Gluteal cleft
• The Cleft, a novel by 2007 Nobel prize laureate Doris Lessing
• Cleft of the Rock, a Muslim site in Jerusalem
• The Cleft, a fictional location in Age of D'ni from the computer game Myst

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