rubble

CEFRB2

/ˈɹʌb.əl/

noun · verb

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    noun

    Broken stones and pieces of buildings left after destruction.

  2. 02

    noun

    Extra detail

    A mass or stratum of fragments of rock lying under the alluvium and derived from the neighbouring rock.

Examples

  • Emergency services are still looking through the rubble for survivors.

  • There is a large pile of rubble where the school building used to be.

At a glance

Sits at B2 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
2
Citations
4

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings

  1. The whole of the bran of wheat before it is sorted into pollard, bran, etc.

  2. The broken remains of an object, usually rock or masonry.

verb

Extra meaning

  1. To break down into rubble.

More examples

In context

  • There is a pile of rubble where the building used to be.

  • The main East Coast line from Edinburgh to Berwick was blocked at Cockburnspath and Grantshouse by flood water, which washed away part of an embankment, and by the collapse of about 300 tons of rubble on to the track.

  • The overlying beds are composed of such calcareous rubble and flints, rudely stratified

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

The old building collapsed into blank after the sudden powerful earthquake struck.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

noun

Inherited from Middle English rouble, rubel, robel, robeil, from Anglo-Norman *robel (“bits of broken stone”). Presumably related to rubbish, originally of same meaning (waste material, bits of stone, rubble). Ultimately presumably from Old Norse rubba (“to huddle, crowd together, heap up", possibly also "to rub, scrape”), from Proto-Germanic *rubbōną (“to rub, scrape”), related to Proto-Germanic *reufaną (“to tear”), *raubōną (“to rob, steal, plunder”), perhaps via Old French robe (English rob (“steal”)) in sense of “plunder, destroy”; see also Middle English, Middle French -el.