flint

Reading level: hard

Estimated CEFR level: B2 — Upper-Intermediate

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

  1. noun a hard kind of stone; a form of silica more opaque than chalcedony
  2. noun a river in western Georgia that flows generally south to join the Chattahoochee River at the Florida border where they form the Apalachicola River
  3. noun a city in southeast central Michigan near Detroit; automobile manufacturing

Etymology

From Middle English flynt, flint, from Old English flint, from Proto-West Germanic *flint, from Proto-Germanic *flintaz (compare Dutch vlint, flint (“flint, cobblestone”), German Flins, Flint (“flint, pebble”), Danish flint (“flint”)), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)plind- (“to split, cleave”) (compare Irish slinn (“slate, shingle”), Ancient Greek πλίνθος (plínthos)), from *(s)pley- (“to split”). More at split.

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