ravine means A deep narrow valley or gorge in the earth's surface worn by running water. It carries an Arena rating of 1500, earned across 4 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, ravine ranks #874 of 14,340 for Most Vivid Words, #1,823 of 14,297 for Best Fossil-Poetry Words, #1,929 of 14,297 for Words That Escaped Their Books, #2,338 of 14,361 for Most Ingenious Words.
ravine is pronounced /ɹəˈviːn/.
Why “ravine” is a great word
A deep, narrow gorge or valley, typically one worn by the action of running water. From French *ravin* ("a gully"), from Old French *raviner* ("to pillage, sweep down, cascade"), from *ravine* ("robbery, rapine; violent rush of water"), from Latin *rapīna* ("robbery, plunder"), first attested in English in the 1610s meaning 'a raging flood'. Unlike a gully, a mere scratch on the landscape, or a canyon, a monumental and ancient rent in the continent, a ravine is a wound of intimate, sudden violence. It is the dark seam in a forest where light falls in narrow blades, the raw, damp cut where roots dangle like exposed nerves, and the hidden channel for a stream's whispered secrets—a testament to how water, given time, performs a patient larceny upon the stone.
Etymology
Borrowed from French ravin (“a gully”), from Old French raviner (“to pillage, sweep down, cascade”), from ravine (“robbery, rapine; violent rush of water, waterfall, avalanche; impetuosity, spirit”), from Latin rapīna (cf. rapine).
noun
- A deep narrow valley or gorge in the earth's surface worn by running water.“Sometimes the earth stretched up towards them with peaks of mountains, sometimes it fell away in steep ravines, blue rivers sang to them as they passed above them, or very faintly came the song of breezes in lone orchards, and far away the sea sang mighty dirges of old forsaken isles.”
Words closest in meaning
By meaning, not spelling — each word's AI semantic fingerprint, nearest first.
- couloir 85% match — A steep gorge along a mountainside. vs ravine →
- dalles 84% match — The rapids in a deep, narrow stream confined between the rock walls of a canyon or gorge. vs ravine →
- chasm 84% match — A deep, steep-sided rift, gap or fissure; a gorge or abyss. vs ravine →
- ghyll 84% match — A ravine. vs ravine →
- kloof 84% match — A deep glen or ravine. vs ravine →
- nullah 83% match — A stream-bed, ravine, or other watercourse; a drain for rain or floodwater. vs ravine →
- cluse 83% match — A defile or narrow gorge, especially one that cuts transversely through the rock of an otherwise continuous ridge. vs ravine →
- fjord 83% match — A long, narrow, deep inlet between cliffs. vs ravine →