abyss
Syllables: a·byssUK/əˈbɪs//əˈbɪs/
abyss noun: hell; the bottomless pit; primeval chaos; a confined subterranean ocean.
Noun
abyss (plural abysses)
- Hell; the bottomless pit; primeval chaos; a confined subterranean ocean.
- 'You cannot enter here,' said Gandalf, and the huge shadow halted. 'Go back to the abyss prepared for you! Go back! Fall into the nothingness that awaits you and your Master. Go!'1955, J. R. R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 190
- A bottomless or unfathomed depth, gulf, or chasm; hence, any deep, immeasurable; any void space.
- Below is the deep abyss of the Lauterbrunnen valley, and at its head a stately semi-circle of mountains, with the pyramidal Lauterbrunnen Breithorn as the centre-piece.1960 December, Voyageur, “The Mountain Railways of the Bernese Oberland”, in Trains Illustrated, page 752
- 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.
- Synonyms:
- gulf
abyss meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali
abyss in Hindi
- hell, bottomless pit
- वितल vital, अतल atal, अथाह athāh, हाविया hāviyā, पाताल pātāl, रसातल rasātal
abyss in Tamil
- bottomless or unfathomed depth
- பாதாளம் pātāḷam
abyss in Urdu
- abyss
- اتھاہ athāh, اتھاہ خلیج athāh xalīj
abyss in Bengali
- hell, bottomless pit
- হাবিয়া habiẏa
More languagesFewer languages
- abyss in Malayalam
- അടി കാണാത്ത ഗർത്തം, കുഴി, പാതാളം, അഗാധത
- abyss in Kannada
- ಅಡಿಯಿಲ್ಲದ ಗುಂಡಿ
- abyss in Gujarati
- અથાહ athāh
- abyss in Sanskrit
- पर्शान párśāna
- abyss in Arabic
- هَاوِيَة hāwiya, هُوَّة huwwa
- abyss in Indonesian
- neraka, jurang tanpa dasar
- abyss in Persian
- مغاک maġâk
Examples of abyss in a sentence
- The disc unfortunately hyzered out into the abyss (OB).
- They saw the slope of evolution sliding ignominiously towards an inhumane, unnatural and unatheistic abyss.
- They are doubts from the abyss that drag their cold and slithery bodies across the soul.
Synonyms of abyss
Forms of abyss
| plural | abysses |
|---|---|
| alternative form (archaic) | abysm |
| alternative form (archaic) | abyssus |
| alternative form (obsolete) | abime |
Origin of abyss
From Middle English abissus, from Late Latin abyssus (“a bottomless gulf”), from Ancient Greek ἄβυσσος (ábussos, “bottomless”, from ἀ- (a-, “not”) + βυσσός (bussós, “deep place”)), from βυθός (buthós, “deep place”). Displaced native Old English neowolnes.
Words formed from abyss
Words that rhyme with abyss
Questions about abyss
- What does abyss mean?
- Abyss means hell; the bottomless pit; primeval chaos; a confined subterranean ocean.
- What is abyss in Hindi?
- Abyss in Hindi is वितल (vital), अतल (atal), अथाह (athāh). See Abyss meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is abyss?
- Abyss is a noun.
- How do you pronounce abyss?
- Abyss is pronounced /əˈbɪs/ (UK).
- What is the plural of abyss?
- The plural of abyss is abysses.
Words near abyss in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: abyss (page history and authors); اتھاہ (Urdu) (page history and authors); abyss (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); abyss (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); અથાહ (Gujarati) (page history and authors); पर्शान (Sanskrit) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-abyss.ogg.
Cite this entry: “abyss.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/abyss. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.