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fault
[ fawlt ]
noun
a fault in the brakes;
a fault in one's character.
Synonyms: shortcoming, frailty, blemish
Antonyms: perfection, merit, strength, virtue
- responsibility for failure or a wrongful act:
It is my fault that we have not finished.
- an error or mistake:
a fault in addition.
- a misdeed or transgression:
to confess one's faults.
- Sports. (in tennis, handball, etc.)
- a ball that when served does not land in the proper section of an opponent's court.
- a failure to serve the ball according to the rules, as from within a certain area.
- Geology, Mining. a break in the continuity of a body of rock or of a vein, with dislocation along the plane of the fracture fault plane.
- Manège. (of a horse jumping in a show) any of a number of improper executions in negotiating a jump, as a tick, knockdown, refusal, or run-out.
- Electricity. a partial or total local failure in the insulation or continuity of a conductor or in the functioning of an electric system.
- Hunting. a break in the line of scent; a losing of the scent; check.
- Obsolete. lack; want.
verb (used with object)
- Geology. to cause a fault in.
- to find fault with, blame, or censure.
fault
/ fɔːlt /
noun
- an imperfection; failing or defect; flaw
- a mistake or error
- an offence; misdeed
- responsibility for a mistake or misdeed; culpability
- electronics a defect in a circuit, component, or line, such as a short circuit
- geology a fracture in the earth's crust resulting in the relative displacement and loss of continuity of the rocks on either side of it
- tennis squash badminton an invalid serve, such as one that lands outside a prescribed area
- (in showjumping) a penalty mark given for failing to clear or refusing a fence, exceeding a time limit, etc
- hunting an instance of the hounds losing the scent
- deficiency; lack; want
- at fault
- guilty of error; culpable
- perplexed
- (of hounds) having temporarily lost the scent
- find faultto seek out minor imperfections or errors (in); carp (at)
- to a faultexcessively
verb
- geology to undergo or cause to undergo a fault
- tr to find a fault in, criticize, or blame
- intr to commit a fault
fault
/ fôlt /
- A fracture in a rock formation along which there has been movement of the blocks of rock on either side of the plane of fracture. Faults are caused by plate-tectonic forces.
- See more at normal faultSee Note at earthquake
fault
- In geology , a place where sections of the crust of the Earth move relative to each other. ( See earthquake and San Andreas fault .)
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Notes
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Other Words From
- post·fault noun
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Word History and Origins
Origin of fault1
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Word History and Origins
Origin of fault1
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A Closer Look
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Idioms and Phrases
- at fault,
- open to censure; blameworthy:
to be at fault for a mistake.
- in a dilemma; puzzled:
to be at fault as to where to go.
- (of hounds) unable to find the scent.
He constantly found fault with my behavior.
- to a fault, to an extreme degree; excessively:
She was generous to a fault.
More idioms and phrases containing fault
see at fault ; find fault ; to a fault .Discover More
Synonym Study
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Example Sentences
For a few minutes it seemed like old times, a return to the clearer fault-lines of the Cold War.
Race is the San Andreas Fault of our culture as well as our history.
It seemed she echoed all the things I was telling myself—this is YOUR fault.
Big Bird's honest reaction will emotionally wreck you in a way even The Fault in Our Stars can't.
It distorts more and more every day of the month, every year, due to the slow effects of fault creep.
You never cared—you were too proud to care; and when I spoke to you about my fault, you did n't even know what I meant.
De Robeck agrees that we don't know enough yet to warrant us in fault-finding or intervention.
At other times they have a dreadful look of being fibs invented for the purpose of covering a fault.
The French Railroads are better in this respect, and the American cannot be worse, though the fault is not unknown there.
At the very commencement of the campaign Massna committed a fault which almost ruined his career.
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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
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