cleave

1. (transitive) To split or sever something with, or as if with, a sharp instrument.Examples: "The wings clove the foggy air."; "O Hamlet, thou hast cleft my heart in twain."; "Hee claue the rockes in the wildernes: and gaue them drinke as out of the great depthes."Synonyms: rivetransitive

2. (transitive, mineralogy) To break a single crystal (such as a gemstone or semiconductor wafer) along one of its more symmetrical crystallographic planes (often by impact), forming facets on the resulting pieces.transitive

3. (transitive) To make or accomplish by or as if by cutting.Examples: "The truck clove a path through the ice."transitive

4. (transitive) (chemistry) To split (a complex molecule) into simpler molecules.transitive

5. (intransitive) To split.Examples: "And it came to passe as he had made an ende of speaking all these words, that the ground claue asunder that was vnder them:"intransitive

6. (intransitive, mineralogy) Of a crystal, to split along a natural plane of division.intransitive