a break or opening, as in a fence, wall, or military line; breach: We found a gap in the enemy's line of fortifications.
an empty space or interval; interruption in continuity; hiatus: a momentary gap in a siren's wailing; a gap in his memory.
a wide divergence or difference; disparity: the gap between expenses and income; the gap between ideals and actions.
a difference or disparity in attitudes, perceptions, character, or development, or a lack of confidence or understanding, perceived as creating a problem: the technology gap; a communications gap.
a deep, sloping ravine or cleft through a mountain ridge.
Chiefly Midland and Southern U.S.a mountain pass: the Cumberland Gap.
Aeronautics. the distance between one supporting surface of an airplane and another above or below it.
early 14c. (mid-13c. in place names), from Old Norse gap "chasm," related to gapa "to gape," from PIE *ghai- "to yawn, gape" (see yawn (v.)). Originally "hole in a wall or hedge;" broader sense is 16c. In U.S., common in place names in reference to a break or pass in a long mountain chain (especially one that water flows through). As a verb from 1847.
