abyss
/əˈbɪs/ noun C1- Hell; the bottomless pit; primeval chaos; a confined subterranean ocean.
- A bottomless or unfathomed depth, gulf, or chasm; hence, any deep, immeasurable; any void space.
- Anything infinite, immeasurable, or profound.
- Moral depravity; vast intellectual or moral depth. · They fell into the abyss of drug addiction.
- An impending catastrophic happening.
- The center of an escutcheon; fess point.
- The abyssal zone.
- A difference, especially a large difference, between groups.
Plural abysses
From the library
“To fall,” continued King Louis, who at the first glance had sounded the abyss on which the monarchy hung suspended,—“to fall, and learn of that fall by telegraph!
Sometimes she stood mute and motionless as a statue, looking towards Marseilles, at other times gazing on the sea, and debating as to whether it were not better to cast herself into the abyss of the ocean, and thus end her woes.
The torrent, swollen by the melting snow, plunges into a tremendous abyss, from which the spray rolls up like the smoke from a burning house.
We stood near the edge peering down at the gleam of the breaking water far below us against the black rocks, and listening to the half-human shout which came booming up with the spray out of the abyss.
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