hiatus means A gap in a series, making it incomplete.
hiatus is pronounced /haɪˈeɪtəs/.
Why “hiatus” is a great word
A gap or interruption in the continuity of a sequence, activity, or work. Learned borrowing from Latin hiātus ("opening, gap"), from hiō ("to stand open, to gape, to yawn") (mid-16th century). Unlike an “interlude”—a deliberate and often pleasant intervening episode—or a “pause”—a brief, intended stop—a hiatus is a substantial, often unlooked-for rupture. It is the missing season of a beloved television show, the hollow where a tooth once was, and the unnerving silence after a name is called and no one answers—the body’s memory of presence, aching around an absence it cannot name.
Etymology
Learned borrowing from Latin hiātus (“opening”) (mid-16th century), from hiō (“stand open, yawn”).
noun
- A gap in a series, making it incomplete.“Even the mechanical engineer comes at last to an end of his figures, and must stand up, a practical man, face to face with the discrepancies of nature and the hiatuses of theory.”
- An interruption, break, pause or absence.“The band decided to go on hiatus, citing creative differences.”
- An temporary break from work, especially one which is unexpected.
- A gap in geological strata.“The beginning of the Mesozoic Era on the Colorado Plateau is marked by a regional hiatus or break of sedimentary deposition that lasted about 25 to 30 Ma.”
- An opening in an organ.“Hiatus aorticus is an opening in the diaphragm through which aorta and thoracic duct pass.”
- A syllable break between two vowels, without an intervening consonant.“A hiatus is agreeable to any Polynesian ear; the ear even of the stranger soon grows used to these barbaric voids; but only in the Marquesan will you find such names as Haaii and Paaaeua, when each individual vowel must be separately uttered.”
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