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STRAIT
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I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A narrow channel of the sea joining two larger bodies of water
Synonyms:
sound; strait
Classified under:
Nouns denoting natural objects (not man-made)
Hypernyms ("strait" is a kind of...):
channel (a deep and relatively narrow body of water (as in a river or a harbor or a strait linking two larger bodies) that allows the best passage for vessels)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "strait"):
narrow (a narrow strait connecting two bodies of water)
Instance hyponyms:
Torres Strait (a strait between northeastern Australia and southern New Guinea that connects the Coral Sea with the Arafura Sea)
Strait of Malacca (the strait between the Malay Peninsula and Sumatra; it connects the Pacific Ocean to the east with the Indian Ocean to the west and is an important shipping lane)
Pas de Calais; Strait of Calais; Strait of Dover (the strait between the English Channel and the North Sea; shortest distance between England and the European continent)
Strait of Messina (the strait separating Sicily from the tip of Italy)
Strait of Magellan (the strait separating South America from Tierra del Fuego and other islands to the south of the continent; discovered by Ferdinand Magellan in 1520; an important route around South America before the Panama Canal was built)
Strait of Hormuz; Strait of Ormuz (a strategically important strait linking the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman)
Strait of Gibraltar (the strait between Spain and Africa)
Strait of Georgia (the strait separating Vancouver Island from the Canadian mainland)
Solent (a strait of the English Channel between the coast of Hampshire and the Isle of Wight)
Skagerak; Skagerrak (a broad strait of the North Sea between Jutland and Norway)
North Channel (a strait between Northern Ireland and Scotland that connects the Atlantic Ocean and the Irish Sea)
Menai Strait (a strait in northern Wales between Anglesey Island and the mainland)
Korea Strait; Korean Strait (a strait between Korea and Japan; connects the East China Sea and the Sea of Japan)
Kattegatt (a strait of the North Sea between Jutland and Sweden; connects with the North Sea through the Skagerrak)
Golden Gate (a strait in western California that connects the San Francisco Bay with the Pacific Ocean; discovered in 1579 by Sir Francis Drake)
Cook Strait (a narrow strait separating the North Island and South Island in New Zealand)
Bosporus (a strait connecting the Mediterranean and the Black Sea; separates the European and Asian parts of Turkey; an important shipping route)
Bering Strait (a strait connecting the Bering Sea to the Arctic Ocean)
East River (a tidal strait separating Manhattan and the Bronx from Queens and Brooklyn)
Canakkale Bogazi; Dardanelles; Hellespont (the strait between the Aegean and the Sea of Marmara that separates European Turkey from Asian Turkey)
Sense 2
Meaning:
A bad or difficult situation or state of affairs
Synonyms:
Classified under:
Nouns denoting stable states of affairs
Hypernyms ("strait" is a kind of...):
situation (a complex or critical or unusual difficulty)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "strait"):
desperate straits; dire straits (a state of extreme distress)
II. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Narrow
Example:
strait is the gate
Classified under:
Similar:
narrow (not wide)
Domain usage:
archaicism; archaism (the use of an archaic expression)
Context examples:
I thought of the life that lay before me—your life, sir—an existence more expansive and stirring than my own: as much more so as the depths of the sea to which the brook runs are than the shallows of its own strait channel.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
The treasurer was of the same opinion: he showed to what straits his majesty’s revenue was reduced, by the charge of maintaining you, which would soon grow insupportable; that the secretary’s expedient of putting out your eyes, was so far from being a remedy against this evil, that it would probably increase it, as is manifest from the common practice of blinding some kind of fowls, after which they fed the faster, and grew sooner fat; that his sacred majesty and the council, who are your judges, were, in their own consciences, fully convinced of your guilt, which was a sufficient argument to condemn you to death, without the formal proofs required by the strict letter of the law.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
I am, I know, either being deceived, like a baby, by my own fears, or else I am in desperate straits; and if the latter be so, I need, and shall need, all my brains to get through.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
At the end of the straits, I made sure we must fall into some bar of raging breakers, where all my troubles would be ended speedily; and though I could, perhaps, bear to die, I could not bear to look upon my fate as it approached.
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
