GAP • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Gap

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/gæp/ Listen

noun

Gap n.

1.

An opening in anything made by breaking or parting; as, a gap in a fence; an opening for a passage or entrance; an opening which implies a breach or defect; a vacant space or time; a hiatus; a mountain pass. "Miseries ensued by the opening of that gap." "It would make a great gap in your own honor."

2.

(Aeronautics) The vertical distance between two superposed surfaces, esp. in a biplane.

Gap lathe (Mach.), a turning lathe with a deep notch in the bed to admit of turning a short object of large diameter.

To stand in the gap, to expose one's self for the protection of something; to make defense against any assailing danger; to take the place of a fallen defender or supporter.

To stop a gap, to secure a weak point; to repair a defect.

verb

Gap v. t.

1.

To notch, as a sword or knife.

2.

To make an opening in; to breach. "Their masses are gapp'd with our grape."

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Etymology of 'Gap'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Gap" Quotes from Famous Books

... upon the piles from above. The Fort Hindman removed a portion of the raft, and then the Eastport got to work on the piles, dragging out some and starting others by ramming. By four o'clock in the afternoon a large enough gap had been made, and the Eastport, followed by the Hindman, Osage, and Cricket, hastened up the river. Rapid artillery firing was heard as they drew near the works, but being ignorant of the position of the Union troops, few shots were fired for fear of injuring them. The slight engagement ...

— The Gulf and Inland Waters - The Navy in the Civil War. Volume 3. • A. T. Mahan

... come down. Seeing still some daylight I took down some few miles of it, so that it could not be defined as an enclosure, but only a drift-fence. During the winter, however, I could not resist closing the gap again. Next season once more appeared a Government agent, who in a rage ordered the fence down under pains and penalties which could not well be longer disregarded. Cattle were up in price; a neighbour had long ...

— Ranching, Sport and Travel • Thomas Carson

... they came to the gap by the yew-tree, and Bartholomew was resting against the trunk, a ...

— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby

... moment I stood and considered it. I had never really visualized it before, any more than you do any place that you take for granted as outside your scheme of existence. I was not so sure that it was, now. Anyhow, I stood in the gap of a desolate hill and looked into the hollow before me that—added to the dirt no skunk could stand—had earned the place its name. It was all stones: gravel stones, little stones, stones as big as cabs and as big as houses; and, hunched ...

— The La Chance Mine Mystery • Susan Carleton Jones

... it entirely out of existence. The mine contained four tons of powder and produced a crater 200 feet by 50 feet and 25 feet deep, and was completed in one month. The sequel to this was to be an attack on the enemy's line through the gap made by the explosion, and such an attack properly followed up would doubtless have had a marked effect in shortening the duration of the war, but this attack was so badly managed that it utterly failed and ...

— Scientific American Supplement, No. 841, February 13, 1892 • Various

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