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vale

vale

8 9.9
A long low area of land between hills or mountains with a river running through it
  • noun
  • /veɪl/
  • Archaic
translation icon : valle
  • The formerly wide vale had compressed into this ravine in a remarkably short period.
  • the vale of tears
  • the vale of soul-making
  • villages in the vale

Examples

  • "I wandered lonely as a cloud that floats on high o'er vales and hills."

  • To begin with, Par was a native of the Vale and accepted in a way that Walker never could be.

    Fiction book (1991)
  • * Oh, come to the church In the vale *

  • I thought that you might return to the Vale, and so placed your parents under my protection.

    Fiction book (1991)
  • Now in the lead, he rushed down a rocky vale that lay between them and the road.

    Fiction book (1992)
  • Walton and Safdie chose for their site a small vale headed by a mineral spring.

    Academic text (2011)
  • Its subject mountains their unearthly forms. Pile around it, ice and rock; broad vales between.

    Academic text (2016)
  • I begin with an idyll, the well of renewal, the myth of the vale as yet untainted.

    Academic text (1998)
  • ¶ Soft the drowsy hours are creeping ¶ ¶ Hill and vale in slumber sleeping ¶

  • The small village lay nestled in a green vale, with a river flowing gently through it.

Synonyms

valley
vsvale
1.0

A low area of land between hills or mountains often with a river running through it

is used mainly in poetic or literary language rather than neutral speech

Compounds

vale of tears
  • Archaic
1 9.9

A life that is full of pain and sadness

How Big

basin
72 3.1
valley
1.0
vale
  • Archaic
8 9.9
glen
8 7.9
dell
50 7.9

Surface Forms

vale singular
vales plural

Etymology

Vale comes from the old Latin word vallis meaning 'valley', and it is the same root as the everyday word valley. So a vale is simply a poetic way to say a long, low area of land, often with a river running through it.