FALD

Fald is a noun used in Danish and Norwegian to denote a fall or downward movement. It can refer to a physical fall, such as a person slipping, or to a decline in quantity, value, or intensity, for example a fall in temperature or a fall in sales. It can also describe a downward slope or gradient of a surface in technical contexts.

In everyday and technical usage, fald appears in meteorology, economics, and sports to describe decreases. In these languages it is used across contexts to express downturns rather than to indicate the act of falling through space. The term tends to be more productive in Scandinavian languages than in English loanword usage.

Etymology: Fald originates from the Germanic language family and is cognate with related terms across the region that express falling or downward movement. It is linked to verbs such as fall/falle in Norse and English fall, sharing the basic sense of descent.