different between river vs falls

English

Etymology 1

From Middle English ryver, river, rivere, from Anglo-Norman rivere, from Old French riviere, from Vulgar Latin *r?p?ria (“riverbank, seashore, river”), from Latin r?p?rius (“of a riverbank”), from Latin r?pa (“river bank”), from Proto-Indo-European *h?reyp- (“to scratch, tear, cut”). Displaced native Old English ?a.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /???v?/
• (General American) enPR: r?v'?r, IPA^(key): /???v?/
• Rhymes: -?v?(?)
• Hyphenation: riv?er

Noun

river (plural rivers)

1. A large and often winding stream which drains a land mass, carrying water down from higher areas to a lower point, oftentimes ending in another body of water, such as an ocean or in an inland sea.
   • 1908, Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows

     By the side of the river he trotted as one trots, when very small, by the side of a man who holds one spell-bound by exciting stories; and when tired at last, he sat on the bank, while the river still chattered on to him, a babbling procession of the best stories in the world, sent from the heart of the earth to be told at last to the insatiable sea.

2. Any large flow of a liquid in a single body.

4. (poker) The last card dealt in a hand.
5. (typography) A visually undesirable effect of white space running down a page, caused by spaces between words on consecutive lines happening to coincide.

Usage notes

• As with the names of lakes and mountains, the names of rivers are typically formed by adding the word before or after the unique term: the River Thames or the Yangtze River. Generally speaking, names formed using adjectives or attributives see river added to the end, as with the Yellow River. It is less common to add river before names than it is with lakes, but many of the rivers of Britain are written that way, as with the River Severn; indeed, British English tends to use "River X" in such cases while American, South African, Australian and New Zealand English use "X River". The former derives from the earlier but now uncommon form river of ~: the 19th century River of Jordan is now usually simply the River Jordan.
• It is common to preface the proper names of rivers with the article the.
• Concerning the reference of its coordinate terms, some people say: you can step over a brook, jump over a creek, wade across a stream, and swim across a river.

Derived terms

Related terms

• tributary (noun)

Descendants

• ? Finnish: river (“river (in poker)”)
• Sranan Tongo: liba

Translations

See river/translations § Noun.

See also

• fluvial
• Category:Rivers

Verb

river (third-person singular simple present rivers, present participle rivering, simple past and past participle rivered)

1. (poker) To improve one’s hand to beat another player on the final card in a poker game.

   Johnny rivered me by drawing that ace of spades.

Etymology 2

rive +? -er

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /??a?v?/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /??a?v?/
• Rhymes: -a?v?(?)

Noun

river (plural rivers)

1. One who rives or splits.

References

Further reading

• river in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Danish

Noun

river c

1. indefinite plural of rive

Verb

river

1. present of rive

Finnish

Etymology

< English river

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?ri?er/, [?ri?e?r]
• Rhymes: -i?er
• Syllabification: ri?ver

Noun

river

1. (poker) river (fifth communal card in Texas hold'em)

Declension

Synonyms

• viides avokortti, viimeinen avokortti

See also

• joki (“river”)

French

Etymology

From a Germanic source (compare Danish rive).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?i.ve/

Verb

river

1. to drive/set a rivet

Conjugation

Related terms

• rive

Further reading

• “river” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Anagrams

• virer

Latin

Verb

r?ver

1. first-person singular present passive subjunctive of r?v?

Middle English

Noun

river

1. Alternative form of ryver

Norwegian Bokmål

Noun

river m or f

1. indefinite plural of rive

Verb

river

1. present of rive

Norwegian Nynorsk

Noun

river f

1. indefinite plural of rive

Verb

river

1. (non-standard since 2012) present tense of riva and rive

Swedish

Verb

river

1. present tense of riva.

Anagrams

• revir, virre

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /f??lz/
• (Canada, cot–caught merger) IPA^(key): /f?lz/
• Rhymes: -??lz

Noun

falls (plural falls)

1. A waterfall.

   Niagara Falls

Derived terms

Translations

Noun

falls

1. plural of fall

Verb

falls

1. Third-person singular simple present indicative form of fall

German

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /fals/

Conjunction

falls

1. (conditional, somewhat formal) if, in the event that

2. (chiefly colloquial) in case, in order to be prepared if

Usage notes

• Falls is synonymous to the more common wenn (“if”), but has the advantage of being unambiguously conditional, while wenn can also be used temporally (meaning "when, whenever").
• Colloquially, falls is used somewhat differently than in standard German proper. It does occur in sense 1, but infrequently. In return, it is often heard in sense 2 where formal usage would require für den Fall, dass.

Synonyms

• (sense 1) wenn
• (sense 2) für den Fall, dass

Related terms

• Fall

Further reading

• “falls” in Duden online

Icelandic

Noun

falls n

1. indefinite genitive singular of fall

Luxembourgish

Etymology

From German falls (17th c.).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /fals/, [f?l(t)s]
• Rhymes: -?ls

Conjunction

falls

1. if (in the case that)

Swedish

Etymology

• Homophone: fals

Noun

falls

1. indefinite genitive singular of fall
2. indefinite genitive plural of fall

See also

• fals