# depth

Pronunciation: say "DEPTH" /dɛpθ/

## Noun

1. The vertical distance from a surface down to a given point; how deep something is.
   - Simple: How far down something goes from its top or surface.
   - _Engineers checked the depth of the foundation before pouring concrete._
   - _The submarine descended to a depth of three hundred meters._
2. The degree to which an emotion, situation, or the like is strong, intense, complex, serious, or significant.
   - Simple: How strong, serious, or complex a feeling, situation, or idea is.
   - _The novel explores the depth of human grief with rare honesty._
   - _Critics praised the emotional depth of her performance._
3. The distance from the front to the back, such as in a drawer or closet.
   - Simple: How far back something goes from front to back, like in a drawer or shelf.
   - _The cabinet's depth made it hard to reach items at the back._
   - _Builders increased the drawer's depth to hold larger files._
4. The deepest, innermost, or most remote part of a place, such as the bottom of the sea or the heart of a forest; usually 'the depths'. *(literary)*
   - Simple: The deepest or farthest part of a place, like the bottom of the sea or the middle of a forest.
   - _Old legends tell of a sunken bell that rings from the depths of the lake on stormy nights._
   - _The old hermit lived alone in the depths of the forest, miles from the nearest road._
5. The quality of appearing three-dimensional, with a sense of space and distance.
   - Simple: The way a flat picture looks like it has space and distance in it.
   - _The photographer blurred the background to give the portrait more depth._
   - _Layered brushstrokes give the landscape surprising depth._
6. The most severe or extreme part of a situation or period.
   - Simple: The most severe or extreme part of something bad.
   - _At the depth of the crisis, supplies ran dangerously low._
   - _Even in the depths of the Depression, the little diner never closed its doors._
7. The number of distinct colors a digital image or display can show, set by the bits used for each pixel.
   - Simple: How many different colors a screen or image can show.
   - _Reducing the image's depth to eight bits limited it to 256 colors._
   - _Photo editors prefer images with a high color depth, since smooth skies then show fewer visible bands._
8. The quality of being low in pitch, as of a voice or sound.
   - Simple: The quality of a voice or sound being low in pitch.
   - _The organ's lowest pipes give the hymn tremendous depth._
   - _His speaking voice had a warm depth that put listeners at ease._

## Other meanings

- (noun) The number of simple elements that an abstract concept includes; its comprehension or content.
- (noun) In aeronautics, the perpendicular distance from the chord of an arched surface, such as an aircraft wing, to the farthest point of its curve; also called camber.
- (noun) The lower of a value's two ranks when counting inward from each end of an ordered set.
- (noun) A set of two or more ciphertexts that have been enciphered with the same key.
- (noun) In horology, a pair of toothed wheels that mesh and work together.
- (noun) In ring theory, an invariant of rings and modules that encodes information about their dimensionality.

## Origin

From Middle English depthe, going back to Old English *dīepþ and Proto-Germanic *diupiþō, and equivalent to "deep" plus the abstract noun suffix "-th". It is related to words like Dutch diepte, German Low German Deepde, and Swedish djup, all meaning "depth".

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/depth (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).