| 释义 |
piedmont, n. (a.)|ˈpiːdmɒnt|
[Orig. (in sense 1) Piemont, after It. Piemonte, lit. ‘mountain foot’, name of a region of N. Italy, f. piede foot (:—L. ped-, pēs) + monte mountain (:—L. mont-, mons).]
1. Also Piedmont. The name of a fertile upland region of the U.S. between the Blue Ridge and Appalachian Mountains to the west and the Atlantic coastal plain to the east, and extending from near New York to Alabama. Freq. attrib.
1755L. Evans Geogr. Ess. 7 Between the South Mountain and the hither Chain of the Endless Mountains..is the most considerable Quantity of valuable Land that the English are possest of; and runs through New-Jersey, Pensilvania, Mariland and Virginia. It has yet obtained no general Name, but may properly be called Piemont, from its Situation. 1855Southern Lit. Messenger XXI. 672/2 The next breadth of country known in several of the States as the Piedmont district, was more salubrious in its atmosphere. 1857‘Porte Crayon’ Virginia Illustr. 235 The soil of this [sc. Amherst Co., Va.], in common with many other of the piedmont counties, is of a bright red in many places. 1905W. H. Norton Elem. Geol. iii. 87 The surface of the Piedmont is gently rolling. 1927H. C. Groome Fauquier during Proprietorship i. 1 A contour line through the falls of these rivers marks the boundary between Tidewater Virginia and that region which rolling upward to the foothills of the Appalachians is today known as the Piedmont Plateau. 1929J. Buchan Courts of Morning ii. xi. 257 A rambling country-house high up in the South Carolina piedmont, with the blue, forested hills behind. 1951Trager & Smith Outl. Eng. Struct. i. 25 In the Southeast of the United States, in both the Coastal and Piedmont speech. 1968R. W. Fairbridge Encycl. Geomorphol. 844/2 The Piedmont Province..is the older part of the Appalachians... Rocks of the piedmont..are of early Paleozoic to Precambrian age. 1972H. Kurath Stud. Area Linguistics viii. 128 From 1790 to 1860 Negro slaves outnumbered the Whites in the piedmont of Virginia. 1976Scottish Rev. Summer 5 After the failure of the Forty-Five, many Highland families moved to the pine barrens and hills of piedmont North Carolina.
2. Any region or area at the foot of a mountain or mountain range.
1860Mayne Reid Odd People 430 Having reached the piedmont of the Andes, you still find yourself on a plain, but one which is elevated 3,000 feet above the point from which you started. 1944A. Holmes Princ. Physical Geol. xi. 201 Where closely spaced streams discharge from a mountainous area across a piedmont (a mountainfoot lowland), their deposits coalesce to form a piedmont alluvial plain. 1960[see bajada]. 1962Times 2 June 11/6 Those along the northern piedmont consider themselves Bughtis and owe their allegiance to the Nawab in the remote tribal capital of Dera Bughti. 1974Encycl. Brit. Micropædia I. 741/3 A bajada is usually composed of gravelly alluvium... In humid climates, landforms of this nature are usually referred to as piedmonts.
3. (See quot. 19051.)
1905H. T. Ferrar in R. F. Scott Voy. ‘Discovery’ II. 461 Large areas of ice which lie at the foot of high land and which have no obvious single source may be described as ‘piedmonts’. Ibid., Piedmonts afloat are by far the most important. 1914[see ice-shelf s.v. ice n. 8].
4. attrib. or as adj. Situated or occurring at the foot of a mountain or mountain range.
1891I. C. Russell in Nat. Geogr. Mag. May 122 The Malaspina glacier belongs to a class of ice bodies not previously recognized, which are formed at the bases of mountains by the union of several glaciers from above. Their position suggests the name of Piedmont glaciers for the type. 1905W. H. Norton Elem. Geol. iv. 99 Mountain streams may build their confluent fans into widespread piedmont (foot of the mountain) alluvial plains. 1907Bull. Geol. Soc. Amer. XVIII. 355 On leaving the mountains the Tarim river enters the great plain which forms the floor of the Lop, or Tarim basin... At the lower ends of many small streams which now wither to nothing in the piedmont gravel or sand of the basin floor, there are old channels and strips of vegetation. 1936P. Fleming News from Tartary 334 It brought us to Igiz Yar, a little oasis on a rolling slope of piedmont gravel. 1942[see pediplane]. 1957G. E. Hutchinson Treat. Limnol. I. i. 57 The numerous and remarkable large lakes produced in piedmont regions. 1962Times 2 June 11/6 The piedmont zone of hill slopes has long formed the ethnic frontier between the plundering hill men and the peaceful Sindhi cultivators. 1965[see oued]. 1974Nature 29 Nov. 373/1 The United States Range where piedmont glaciers descend southwards along the northern edge of the Hazen Plateau. 1976R. C. Selley Introd. Sedimentol. viii. 257 Between mountains and adjacent lowlands it is often possible to define a distinct belt known as the piedmont zone. |