breach

Pluralbreaches

Formsbreaches, breaching, breached

1. 1
   nouncountable

   A failure to obey a law or to carry out an obligation, promise, or binding tie; a violation.

   The regulator found the bank guilty of a breach of financial law.

   Missing the deadline counted as a breach of their agreement.

   Similarviolation, infringement, contravention, infraction, transgression

   Oppositeobservance, compliance, fulfillment

   Note

   Law's use of the word nearly always takes of: a breach of promise, of contract, of a law. What is broken is a duty rather than a thing, so the phrase names the duty. The verb works the same way, as in to breach an agreement, but it drops the of and takes the obligation as its direct object.

2. 2
   nouncountable

   A gap or opening made by breaking or battering, such as in a wall, fortification, or levee; the space torn open in a solid body.

   The attackers stormed the fortress through a breach in its outer wall.

   Engineers worked through the night to close the breach in the dam.

   Similarbreak, rupture, fissure

   Note

   The physical sense the others build on: Middle English breche, from Old English bryċe and brǣċ, words for fracture and breaking. A breach is always made, never simply found. It is the gap that force leaves in a wall, a levee or a canal bank. Shakespeare's Henry V cries "Once more unto the breach," meaning the hole in a besieged wall that the dead might otherwise close.

3. 3
   verbtransitive

   To violate or break a law, agreement, or obligation.

   Companies that breach environmental laws face heavy penalties.

   He breached the confidentiality agreement by leaking the documents.

   Similarviolate, break, contravene, infringe, flout

   Oppositeobey, observe, honor, uphold

4. 4
   verbtransitive

   To make a gap or opening in a wall, barrier, or defensive structure.

   Storm surges can breach coastal defenses within minutes.

   The troops finally breached the enemy's fortifications.

   Similarbreak, penetrate, pierce, rupture, storm

5. 5
   verbintransitive

   Of a whale or other large sea animal, to leap clear of the water's surface.

   Humpback whales breach repeatedly during the migration season.

   The orca breached just yards from the kayakers.

   Similarleap, jump

   Note

   A whalers' term that naturalists took up. Robert Hamilton's The natural history of the ordinary cetacea or whales (1837) still sets off 'breaching' with the phrase 'as it is called.' The verb takes no object: a whale breaches; it does not breach the surface. That keeps it apart from breaching a wall. It means the whole body clears the water, not a glimpse of back or fluke.

6. 6
   nouncountable

   A breaking up of friendly relations between people; a falling out.

   The disagreement led to a permanent breach within the family.

   Years of rivalry finally opened a breach between the partners.

   Similarrift, rupture, split, estrangement, schism

   Oppositereconciliation

   Note

   Shakespeare uses it in Othello for a quarrel between men: "There's fallen between him and my lord / An unkind breach." The usual construction is a breach between two parties, and the word implies a closeness that was once whole and is now split. That lost friendship is what separates it from the "divide" meaning, where the two sides may never have been close at all.

7. 7
   nouncountable

   A breaking out against someone or something; an assault.

   And Dauid was diſpleaſed, becauſe the Lord had made a breach vpon Uzza; wherefore that place is called Perez-Uzza, to this day.

   1611, The Holy Bible, King James Version

   Similarassault, attack, onslaught

   Note

   An older sense that turns on the construction make a breach upon someone. The breach here is an attack that breaks out against a person. The King James Bible of 1611 says the Lord made a breach upon Uzza and that the place was called Perez-Uzza after it. Modern readers easily mistake it for the gap meaning, so this is a sense to recognize when reading, not one to use.

8. 8
   nounfigurativelycountable

   A gap or division between people arising from differences in opinion, social class, or the like.

   Education helped narrow the breach between the two communities.

   A deep breach in values split the older and younger members.

   Similargap, gulf, divide, rift, chasm

9. 9
   nouncountable

   The act of breaking, understood in a figurative rather than physical sense.

   Critics described the move as a breach of long-held tradition.

   The vote represented a breach with decades of party policy.

   Similarbreak, rupture, departure

10. 10
    nouncountable

    A breaking of waves over a vessel or coastal defense; the surging water that breaks through.

    The sailors clung on as a violent breach poured over the bow.

    Each breach of the sea over the embankment carried away more sand.

    Similarsurge, surf

    Note

    Seafaring speech drew fine lines here. In a clear breach, waves roll over a vessel without breaking. In a clean breach, everything on deck is swept away. Defoe's Robinson Crusoe pairs "the breach and froth of the sea," and the King James Bible of 1611 compares the Lord breaking forth upon David's enemies to "the breach of waters." Surge and surf are its near neighbors.

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