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Which landscape feature can be described as a precipice?

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precipice

American  

[pres-uh-pis] / ˈprɛs ə pɪs /

noun

• precipices
  plural

1. 

   a cliff with a vertical, nearly vertical, or overhanging face.

2. a situation of great peril.

   on the precipice of war.

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precipice British  

/ ˈprɛsɪpɪs /

noun

1. 1. the steep sheer face of a cliff or crag

   2. the cliff or crag itself

2. a precarious situation

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• precipiced
  adjective
• unprecipiced
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• precipices
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of precipice

1590–1600; < Middle French < Latin praecipitium steep place, equivalent to praecipit- (stem of praeceps ) steep, headlong ( prae- pre- + -cipit-, combining form of caput head; see caput) + -ium -ium

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Explanation

Cartoon characters often end up on a precipice, the edge of a steep cliff, where their chubby toes curl and cling as they totter and eventually fall, making a hole in the ground below and getting up again. Most real people avoid precipices. Unless you're a skilled climber or mountain-sport enthusiast, a precipice is a scary thing. Some imagine falling off and making the sharp drop, while others get dizzy just thinking about looking down. This makes sense, considering that the 17th-century English word precipice comes, through French, from Latin words meaning "headlong" and "abrupt descent." In modern use, precipice also describes how it feels to fall, or fail, in areas of life that don't involve mountains, such as being "on the precipice of losing everything."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

precipice precipices

He answered my phone call in South Carolina, while overlooking the Atlantic Ocean; his mother was on the precipice of getting married a second time.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 15, 2026

At the precipice of the financial crisis, the government-sponsored enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, with their implicit government guarantee and imprimatur, either securitized or guaranteed roughly half of all mortgages in the U.S.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 20, 2026

The late photographer Jim Marshall was on hand that evening, capturing the spirit, such as it was, of a band on the precipice of something even greater than anyone could have imagined.

From Salon ● Jun. 26, 2026

The hotel, whose guests had reportedly been quietly asked to leave to accommodate the talks, loomed down from the mountain top precipice.

From Barron's ● Jun. 19, 2026

It canted toward a one-hundred-foot-high precipice without even a tree to slow the bus down if it went over.

From "October Sky" by Homer Hickam

Most of the sheep huddle in sleep, while the more adventurous ones and, predictably, the goats perch on rocky precipices.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 26, 2025

In addition to groundwater depletion, rising insurance costs and extreme heat, the U.N. report highlights melting glaciers, ecosystem collapse and space debris as systems nearing precipices.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 26, 2023

Landslides in Himachal Pradesh killed more than 50 people this month, with houses flattened and buses and cars hanging on the edge of precipices after roads gave way.

From Reuters ● Aug. 24, 2023

Too much focus on targets like 1.5°C can backfire if they are seen as precipices beyond which there is no redemption, says Tebaldi: “People feel this sense of disempowerment.”

From Science Magazine ● Aug. 9, 2021

He had spoken to the Mountain of Gont, calming it, and had stilled the trembling precipices of the Overfell as one soothes a frightened beast.

From "A Wizard of Earthsea" by Ursula K. Le Guin

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Related Words

• bluff
• cliff
• crag

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