strait
/stɹeɪt/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.60 in modern English
6
Scrabble Score
6
Letters
1
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A narrow channel of water connecting two larger bodies of water.
Example Sentences
- "Sweet oil was poured out on thy head And ran down like cool rain between The strait close locks it melted in."
- "Where shall we keep the holiday, And duly greet the entering May? Too strait and low our cottage doors, And all unmeet our carpet floors; […]"
- "1894, Ernest Dowson, “To One in Bedlam” in The Second Book of The Rhymers’ Club, London: Elkin Mathews & John Lane, p. 35, Those scentless wisps of straw, that miserably line His strait, caged universe, whereat the dull world stares, Pedant and pitiful."
- "to follow the strait and narrow"
- "[he] takes on him to reform Some certain edicts and some strait decrees That lie too heavy on the commonwealth,"
- "[…] after the most straitest sect of our religion I lived a Pharisee."
Etymology
From Middle English streit, from Old French estreit (modern form étroit), from Latin strictus, perfect passive participle of stringō (“compress, tighten”). Doublet of stretto and strict.