cloven

American  

[kloh-vuhn] / ˈkloʊ vən /

verb

1. a past participle of cleave

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adjective

1. cleft; split; divided.

   Goats have cloven hoofs.

cloven British  

/ ˈkləʊvən /

verb

1. a past participle of cleave 1

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adjective

1. split; cleft; divided

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• uncloven
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of cloven

First recorded in 1150–1200, for the adjective

Explanation

Something that's cloven is divided in two. Goats, with their funny, two-toed feet, are often described as having cloven hooves. It's common to see the adjective cloven describing the hooves of animals like sheep, goats, and deer. Jewish religious law specifies that animals that have cloven hooves but don't chew their cud, like pigs, are unclean and shouldn't be eaten. Other things can be cloven, too, if they're divided from each other. If you break up with your girlfriend, you can say the two of you are now cloven. The Old English root, cleofan, means "to split or separate."

Example Sentences

Foot and mouth disease is a highly contagious virus that affects cloven hooved animals.

From Reuters • Jul. 20, 2022

“Luckenbooth” starts in 1910 and creeps across the 20th century on cloven feet.

From Washington Post • Dec. 21, 2021

Made with both graphite and acrylic, the busy scenes achieve an entrancing variety of tones: acres of newspaper gray, crinkling across the drawings’ shallow perspective, are periodically cloven by a sudden swath of velvety black.

From New York Times • Sep. 9, 2021

“And in their most unmitigable rage into a cloven pine, within which rift imprisoned he didst painfully—”

From The New Yorker • Jul. 8, 2019

Each monster was about the size of a cow, with a bowed back like a broken-down horse, matted gray fur, skinny legs, and black cloven hooves.

From "The House of Hades" by Rick Riordan