conflux

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English

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Etymology

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Borrowed from Latin cōnflūxus.

Noun

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conflux (plural confluxes)

  1. A merger of rivers, or the place where rivers merge.
    • 1722, Daniel Defoe, A Tour Through the Eastern Counties of England:
      It stands on the conflux of two rivers—the Chelmer, whence the town is called, and the Cann.
  2. A convergence or moving gathering of forces, people, or things.
    • 1671, John Milton, “The Fourth Book”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: [] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey [], →OCLC, page 81, lines 61–66:
      Thence to the gates caſt round thine eye, and ſee / What conflux iſſuing forth, or entring in: / Pretors, Proconſuls to thir Provinces / Haſting or on return, in robes of State; / Lictors and rods the enſigns of thir power; / Legions and Cohorts, turmes of horſe and wings: []
    • 1871–1872, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], chapter LXIV, in Middlemarch [], volume IV, Edinburgh, London: William Blackwood and Sons, →OCLC, book VII, page 42:
      There was a conflux of emotions and thoughts in him that would not let him either give thorough way to his anger or persevere with simple rigidity of resolve.
    • 1903, Stanley J. Weyman, chapter 24, in The Long Night:
      So great was the conflux of torches, the flash and gleam of weapons, and the babel of sounds that it wrought on the mind the impression of a fire blazing up in the night.

Synonyms

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