ESCARPMENT

In geology, an 'escarpment' is a transition zone between different physiogeographic provinces that involves an elevation differential, often involving high cliffs. Most commonly, an escarpment, also called a 'scarp' (from the Italian ''scarpa''^[1]), is a transition from one series of sedimentary rocks to another series of a different age and composition. In such cases, the escarpment usually represents the line of erosional loss of the newer rock over the older (see also Cuesta).


Escarpments are also frequently formed by faults. These are called fault scarps. In some cases land may be lifted to an elevation above the surrounding area by a thrust fault, or the reverse with a normal fault. A strike-slip fault may bring a piece of high ground adjacent to an area of lower ground. The latter is common in California along the San Andreas fault and the many other strike-slip faults in the area.
In England escarpments are found in a diagonal line across the country from the Yorkshire coast on the North Sea to the Hampshire coast on the English Channel. There the features of an escarpment include the 'scarp slope' (the leading edge); the 'dip slope', dry valleys, coombes (both found in chalk downland), and clay vales occur on the side away from the scarp.
There are escarpments on other planets besides Earth. They are believed to be created when the crust contracts; as a result of cooling.
More loosely the term is used to describe the zone between coastal lowlands and continental plateau which have a marked change in altitude.

Contents

Significant escarpments

See also

References

Significant escarpments

★ Africa

★
★ God's Window (South Africa)

★
★ Bandiagara Escarpment (Mali)

★
★ Zambezi Escarpment (Zambia)

★
★ Scarp of Angola (Angola)

★ Australia

★
★ Darling Scarp

★
★ Illawarra Escarpment

★ Canada and the United States

★
★ Niagara Escarpment (Ontario, Illinois, Michigan, New York, and Wisconsin)

★
★ Onondaga (geological formation) (Ontario and New York)

★
★ Devil's Rock (Lake Temiskaming, Ontario)

★ England

★
★ Cotswold escarpment

★
★ North Downs

★
★ South Downs

★
★ A colloquial adjective to describe escarpments in England is "edge" as in

★
★
★ Alderley Edge

★
★
★ Edge Hill famous as the place of the first battle of the English Civil War.

★
★
★ Kinver Edge

★
★
★ The Lincoln Edge

★
★
★ Wenlock Edge

★ France

★
★ La Côte d'Or is famous for its wines and has given its name to a département, Côte-d'Or.

★
★ Le Pays de Bray, a clay vale enclosed by chalk escarpments.

★ Germany

★
★ Swabian Alb

★ New Zealand

★
★ The western slope of the Southern Alps (along the Alpine Fault)

★ United States

★
★ Allegheny Front (Pennsylvania-Maryland-West Virginia)

★
★ Caprock Escarpment (Texas)

★
★ Catskill Escarpment (New York)

★
★ Cody Scarp (Florida)

★
★ Pottsville Escarpment (Kentucky-Tennessee; see Cumberland Plateau)

★
★ Highland Rim encircling the Nashville Basin (actually a geologic dome) in Middle Tennessee

★
★ Pine Ridge (Nebraska and South Dakota)

★
★ Missouri Escarpment (North Dakota)

★
★ Muldraugh Hill (Kentucky)

★
★ Balcones Fault (Texas)

★
★ Mogollon Rim (Arizona)

★
★ Sierra Nevada range (eastern slope) in California.

See also

★ Dip slope

★ Cuesta

★ Fall line

★ List of scarps on Mercury

★ Strike and dip

References

1. http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?sourceid=Mozilla-search&va=scarp