Word.ws English Dictionary

gulf

/ɡʌlf/

gulf noun: a hollow place in the earth; an abyss; a deep chasm or basin.

Noun

gulf (plural gulfs)

  1. A hollow place in the earth; an abyss; a deep chasm or basin.
    • He then surveyed / Hell and the gulf between.1667, John Milton, “Book III”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished...
    • Of course, there was no arguing against this, but one thing was clear, we could not attempt that leap in the dark; the only thing to do was to wait for the ray of light which pierced through the gulf at sunset.1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC
  2. (obsolete) That which swallows; the gullet.
    • Witch's mummy, maw and gulf / Of the ravined salt sea shark,c. 1606 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Macbeth”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount...
  3. That which swallows irretrievably; a whirlpool; a sucking eddy.
    • [T]here is no such mine, / None; but a gulf of ruin, swallowing gold, not making.1864, Alfred Tennyson, “Sea Dreams”, in Enoch Arden, &c., London: Edward Moxon & Co., […], →OCLC, page 100
  4. A portion of an ocean or sea extending into the land; a partially landlocked sea
    • the Gulf of Mexico
    • the Persian Gulf
  5. A large deposit of ore in a lode.
  6. (figuratively) A wide interval or gap; a separating space.
    • Between us and you there is a great gulf fixed.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Luke 16:26
    • `Behold now, let the Dead and Living meet! Across the gulf of Time they still are one.'1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC
  7. (figuratively) A difference, especially a large difference, between groups.
    • Only the gulf between them was widened still further by the Negro cops in the precinct, bad-mouthing among themselves about their fellow white cops unnecessarily throwing their authority around and singling out Sullivan as a prime example.1970, Wally Ferris, Across 110th, page 106
    • England were graphically illustrating the huge gulf in class between the sides and it was no surprise when Lampard added the second just before the half hour. Steven Gerrard found his Liverpool team-mate Glen Johnson and Lampard arrived in the area with perfect timing to glide a header beyond...2012 September 7, Phil McNulty, “Moldova 0-5 England”, in BBC Sport
    Synonyms:
    abyss, rift
  8. (Oxbridge slang) The bottom part of a list of those awarded a degree, for those who have only just passed.
    • Some ten or fifteen men just on the line, not enough to be plucked or good enough to be placed, are put into the "gulf," as it is popularly called (the Examiners' phrase is "Degrees allowed"), and have their degrees given to them but are not printed in the calendar, nor were they at this time...1852, Charles Astor Bristed, Five Years in an English University, page 205

Verb

gulf (third-person singular simple present gulfs, present participle gulfing, simple past and past participle gulfed)

  1. (transitive) To engulf.
    • […] if with thee the roaring wells
      ⁠Should gulf him fathom-deep in brine;
      ⁠And hands so often clasp’d in mine,
      Should toss with tangle and with shells.1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto X”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC
  2. (transitive, Oxbridge slang) To award a degree to somebody who has only just passed sufficiently.
    • The mention of gulfed and plucked men brings me back to myself.1852, Charles Astor Bristed, Five Years in an English University, pages 228–229
    • The good Professor scolded, predicted that they would all be either gulfed or ploughed.1863, Henry Kingsley, Austin Elliot, page 123

Proper noun capitalized: Gulf

the Gulf

  1. The Persian Gulf, or the region surrounding it.
    • Gulf States
    • Gulf War
  2. The Gulf of Mexico, or the region surrounding it.
    • Gulf States
    • Gulf Stream
  3. An epoch constituting a subdivision of the Cretaceous.
    Synonyms:
    Gulfian

gulf meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

gulf in Hindi

geography
खाड़ी khāṛī, उपसागर upsāgar

gulf in Tamil

geography
வளைகுடா vaḷaikuṭā

gulf in Marathi

आखात, आखाती

gulf in Urdu

geography
خَلِیج xalīj, کھاڑِی khāṛī
More languagesFewer languages
gulf in Bengali
উপসাগর upośagor
gulf in Telugu
గల్ఫ్
gulf in Malayalam
ഉൾക്കടൽ, ഭൂമിയിലെ പിളർപ്പ്, നീർച്ചുഴി, ഭീകരഗർത്തം
gulf in Kannada
ಕಂದರ kandara
gulf in Punjabi
خلیج xalīj, ਖਲੀਜ khalīj, ਖਾਈ khāī
gulf in Gujarati
અખાત akhāt
gulf in Odia
ଉପସାଗରୀଯ଼
gulf in Nepali
गल्फ
gulf in Pashto
خليج xalij
gulf in Tagalog
golpo
gulf in Arabic
خَلِيج ḵalīj
gulf in Malay
teluk
gulf in Indonesian
jurang, teluk
gulf in Thai
อ่าว àao
gulf in Vietnamese
vịnh
gulf in Myanmar
ကွေ့ kwe.

Examples of gulf in a sentence

  • England were graphically illustrating the huge gulf in class between the sides and it was no surprise when Lampard added the second just before the half hour.2012 September 7, Phil McNulty, “Moldova 0-5 England”, in BBC Sport:
  • The gulf between the Labour leadership’s past positions and the milder proposals in the manifesto means that enormous uncertainty hangs over what a Corbyn-led government would do in office.2018 May 17, “Corbynomics would change Britain—but not in the way most people think”, in The Economist:
  • The result is a widening gulf between people’s reality and what they are relentlessly told they actually believe in and care about.2023 August 7, Nesrine Malik, “British people are kinder and less divided than politicians give us credit for”, in The Guardian:

All 23 example sentences with gulf

Synonyms of gulf

Forms of gulf

Noun
pluralgulfs
alternative formgulph
Verb
third-person singular presentgulfs
present participlegulfing
past participlegulfed
pastgulfed

Plural of gulf: gulfs

Origin of gulf

From Middle English gulf, goulf, golf, from Old French golf, from Italian golfo, from Late Latin colfos, from Ancient Greek κόλπος (kólpos, “bosom, gulf”), of obscure origin, but possibly from Proto-Indo-European *kʷelp- (“to curve, arch”).

Words formed from gulf

Phrases with gulf

49 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with gulf

Questions about gulf

What does gulf mean?
Gulf means a hollow place in the earth; an abyss; a deep chasm or basin.
What is gulf in Hindi?
Gulf in Hindi is खाड़ी (khāṛī), उपसागर (upsāgar). See Gulf meaning in Hindi.
How do you use gulf in a sentence?
England were graphically illustrating the huge gulf in class between the sides and it was no surprise when Lampard added the second just before the half hour.
What part of speech is gulf?
Gulf can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce gulf?
Gulf is pronounced /ɡʌlf/.
What is the plural of gulf?
The plural of gulf is gulfs.

Words near gulf in the dictionary

  1. gules
  2. gulet
  3. gulets
  4. Gulezian
  5. Gulezians
  6. gulf
  7. Gulf Arabic
  8. Gulf Coast
  9. Gulf County
  10. Gulf Creek
  11. Gulf flounder

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: gulf (page history and authors); Gulf (page history and authors); gulf (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); gulf (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); gulf (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); خلیج (Punjabi) (page history and authors); gulf (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); gulf (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-gulf.ogg.

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