fjord

fjord — noun

1. a long, narrow arm of the sea that reaches into the land between high cliffs or

1.nounC1
Definition

a long, narrow arm of the sea that reaches into the land between high cliffs or steep mountains, formed by glacial erosion; most famously found along the coast of Norway

Example

Aiko took a boat tour through the deep blue waters of a Norwegian fjord.

collocation: boat tour through a fjord

The cliffs on both sides of the fjord rose three hundred metres above the water.

Common collocations
  • a Norwegian fjord
  • sail through a fjord
  • fjord cruise
  • the edge of the fjord
  • deep fjord waters
Synonyms
  • inlet

    a general term for any narrow body of water leading inland; less specific than fjord

  • sound

    a narrow sea passage between two landmasses, often wider and less steep-sided than a fjord

Usage Note

The word comes from Norwegian, where 'fjord' refers to any long, narrow inlet. In English it is used mainly for the steep-walled inlets of Norway, though similar landforms in New Zealand and Chile are also called fjords. Common pronunciation is /fjɔːrd/ (rhymes with 'ford') or /fiːˈɔːrd/.

Common Mistakes

We sailed across the fjord from one island to another.
We sailed along the fjord toward the village at its head.
A fjord is a long, narrow inlet; you sail along it (through its length) or into it, not 'across' it as if it were a wide bay.

Word family

  • fjord-like
    adjectiveC2
  • fjordic
    adjectiveC2

Synonym discussion

Sense: noun/1

Fjord, inlet, sound, and bay all describe bodies of water that reach into the land, but they differ in shape and origin. A fjord is a very narrow, steep-walled inlet carved by a glacier — the cliffs are tall and the water is deep. An inlet is a general word for any indentation of the coastline, large or small, steep or flat. A sound is a broader sea passage that typically separates two landmasses (e.g., Puget Sound) and may have gentle shores. A bay is the widest and most open of the four — a curved recess in the coastline. You would not call a wide, sandy bay a fjord, nor would you call a sheer-sided Norwegian fjord a bay.

fjord ↗inletsound ↗bay ↗

Common collocations

Nouns

Phrases

  • sail through a fjord
  • fjord cruise
  • the mouth of the fjord
  • at the head of the fjord

Prepositions

Etymology

Old NorseNorwegianEnglish

Borrowed directly from Norwegian 'fjord', which comes from Old Norse 'fjǫrðr' (a sea inlet). This Germanic root is related to English 'firth' (a narrow inlet) and 'ford' (a river crossing) — all sharing the sense of a passage or crossing of water. The word entered English in the 17th century as travellers and geographers described Norway's coastline.