Word.ws English Dictionary

cryptorheic

cryptorheic adjective: draining through invisible, subterranean outflows.

Adjective

cryptorheic (not comparable)

  1. Draining through invisible, subterranean outflows.
    • A reasonable deduction would be that under karst (cryptorheic) conditions no surface streams would exist and that we should not look for a "drowned" surface drainage pattern.1973, W. Manser, New Guinea Barrier Reefs, page 171
    • Sonoran — extends from Río Sonoyta to the Río Yaqui and intervening small basins, most of them cryptorheic, through desert and semi-desert areas, west of the Sierra Madre Occidental.1998, David P. Olson, Freshwater Biodiversity of Latin America and the Caribbean, page 35
  2. (obsolete) Pertaining to an unspecified or unidentified discharge or secretion.

Origin of cryptorheic

From crypto- (prefix meaning ‘hidden’) + Ancient Greek ῥέω (rhéō, “to flow, gush, stream”) + -ic (suffix meaning ‘of or pertaining’ to forming adjectives).

Questions about cryptorheic

What does cryptorheic mean?
Cryptorheic means draining through invisible, subterranean outflows.
What part of speech is cryptorheic?
Cryptorheic is an adjective.

Words near cryptorheic in the dictionary

  1. cryptorchidisms
  2. cryptorchids
  3. cryptorchis
  4. cryptorchism
  5. cryptorchisms
  6. cryptorheic
  7. cryptorheism
  8. cryptorhynchine
  9. cryptorhynchines
  10. cryptos
  11. cryptoscope

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cryptorheic (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:

Cite this entry: “cryptorheic.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cryptorheic. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.