- flood
- flood n1 *flow, stream, current, tide, flux2 Flood, deluge, inundation, torrent, spate, cataract are comparable when they mean a great or overwhelming flow of or as if of water.Flood basically implies the flowing of water, often in great abundance, over land not usually submerged; it therefore suggests usually something (as a stream) that exceeds or breaks its normal bounds, but it carries in itself no clear implication of the ultimate cause{
the disastrous Mississippi river floods of 1936
}{his home was washed away by the flood
}{a flood of advertising was sent through the mail
}{messages of sympathy came in a flood
}{the rising floo d of students is very much like the barbarian invasions— Bush
}Deluge may apply to a flood that destroys or drowns but especially to a tremendous and continuous downpour of rain; the term seldom suggests a flood which results from a melting of snows, a rising river, or a tidal wave. In its extended uses it implies, sometimes hyperbolically, a power that, through force of numbers, of volume, or of quantity cannot be resisted or that sweeps one away{the rain descended in a deluge
}{the waters have not yet abated from the deluge
}{the memorable deluge of the thirteenth century out of which the Zuyder Zee was born— Motley
}{a deluge of criticisms fell on him from all sides
}{the frightful deluge of spoken and printed palaver— Sat. Review
}{she becomes lost in the overflow — a formless, unending deluge of realistic detail— Robert Humphrey
}Inundation implies a flood caused by a stream, lake, or exceptionally high tide overflowing adjacent land; it therefore stresses something that overspreads and extends far and wide{the annual inundation of Egypt by the Nile
}{the threat of inundation by the sea— Mumford
}{his tears were not drops but a little inundation down his cheeks— Wescott
}{an inundation of Italy by barbarians
}Torrent implies an impetuous rushing or surging of waters (as of a river in flood or of a stream that follows a steep course). It stresses the violence and rapid movement of the stream rather than its destructiveness or its capacity for spreading far and wide, and in extended use may be applied to something that comes forth with the same suddenness, the same violence, and the same clear direction{a torrent of water swept down the hillside
}{he used to say that the mountain torrents were the first road builders, and that wherever they found a way, he could find one— Cat her
}{pouring forth that torrent of stinging invective— Hudson}}
}{philosophy . . . provided a foothold for man above the torrent of circumstance— Buchan
}Spate refers literally to a stream that has suddenly become full, agitated, and turbulent under the influence of a spring freshet or violent rains; hence in its extended applications it suggests a sudden swelling or outpouring of what usually flows in a quiet stream{when you are a big man, and fish such a stream as that, you will hardly care . . . whether she be roaring down in full spate— Kingsley
}{he had hardly sat down when he began to talk full spate—about the war, the war of 1914— Henry Miller
}{the spate of books on conservatism and liberalism in America— Niebuhr
}{a spate of inventions in the early years of the century
}Cataract denotes a waterfall or a steep rapids characterized by a great volume of water descending precipitously or headlong; it is some-times applied to something (as a deluge of rain or of words) that suggests such a waterfall or rapids in its overwhelming downpour or rush{blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow! You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout— Shak.
}{the cataract of nastiness which he poured alike on Piso and Clodius and Gabinius— Froude
}{no doubt flaming cataracts of lava rushed down the sides of Vesuvius on that terrible day— Lucas
}Analogous words: *flow, stream, tide, current
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
