crag

See also: crág and crág-

English

Etymology 1

13th century Middle English, of Celtic origin, possibly from the late Proto-Indo-European/substrate *kar (“stone, hard”); see also Old Armenian քար (kʿar, “stone”), Sanskrit खर (khara, “hard, solid”), Welsh carreg (“stone”).

Related Celtic descendants include Scots craig, Scottish Gaelic creag, Irish creag, Welsh craig, Manx creg.

Alternative forms

• craig

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /kɹæɡ/

  • Audio (UK)

    (file)

• Rhymes: -æɡ

Noun

crag (plural crags)

1. A rocky outcrop; a rugged steep rock or cliff.
   • 1810, Walter Scott, The Lady of the Lake; a Poem, Edinburgh: Printed [by James Ballantyne and Co.] for John Ballantyne and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, and William Miller, OCLC 6632529, (please specify the canto number)(please specify the stanza number):

     From crag to crag the signal flew.

   • 1842, Alfred Tennyson, Break, Break, Break‎^[1]:

     Break, break, break, / At the foot of thy crags, O sea! / But the tender grace of a day that is dead / Will never come back to me.

2. A rough broken fragment of rock.
3. (geology) A partially compacted bed of gravel mixed with shells, of the Tertiary age.

Derived terms

• cragfast
• Crag Foot
• craggy
• cragsman

Translations

a rocky outcrop

• Albanian: shkrep (sq) m, skërkë (sq) f
• Arabic: جُرْفٌ‎ m (jurfun)
• Belarusian: скала́ f (skalá)
• Bulgarian: чукар (bg) m (čukar), канара (bg) f (kanara)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 峭壁 (zh) (qiàobì), 崖 (zh) (yá)

• Czech: útes (cs) m, převis (cs) m
• Finnish: kalliojyrkänne
• Galician: penedo m
• Georgian: კლდე (ḳlde)
• German: Felsen (de) m

• Greek:

  Ancient: κρημνός m (krēmnós), ἐρίπνη f (erípnē)

• Italian: costone (it) m, dirupo (it) m, strapiombo (it) m, precipizio (it) m, bricco m, bric m
• Japanese: 巨岩 (ja) (きょがん, kyogan), 崖 (ja) (がけ, gake)
• Latin: scopulus m
• Polish: skała (pl) f
• Portuguese: rochedo (pt) m, penha (pt) m
• Russian: скала́ (ru) f (skalá), утёс (ru) m (utjós)
• Scottish Gaelic: creag f, carraig f
• Spanish: afloramiento rocoso m, peñón m
• Ukrainian: ске́ля f (skélja)

Etymology 2

A variant of craw.

Noun

crag (plural crags)

1. (obsolete or dialect) The neck or throat.

Further reading

• crag on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

References

• Dravidian Origins and the West: Newly Discovered Ties with the Ancient Culture and Languages, Including Basque, of the Pre-Indo-European Mediterranean World, p. 325
• Webster's New World College Dictionary, Fifth Edition
• Scigliano, Eric (2007): Michelangelo's Mountain: The Quest For Perfection in the Marble Quarries of Carrara, p. 84

Anagrams

• CAGR