Jump to content

calcareous

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

[edit]

Etymology

[edit]
English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Learned borrowing from Latin calcārius (“of or pertaining to lime”), derived from calx (“lime”). Similar to calcium.

Pronunciation

[edit]

Adjective

[edit]

calcareous (comparative more calcareous, superlative most calcareous)

  1. Resembling, containing, or composed of calcium carbonate or limestone; chalky.
    • 1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, volume I, London: Macmillan and Co., page 405:
      The next morning I went to see the hot-springs and mud volcanoes, for which this place is celebrated. A picturesque path among plantations and ravines brought us to a beautiful circular basin about forty feet in diameter, bordered by a calcareous ledge, so uniform and truly curved, that it looked like a work of art.
    • 1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, volume 1, London: James R. Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., page 15:
      The traveller from the coast, who, after plodding northward for a score of miles over calcareous downs and corn-lands, suddenly reaches the verge of one of these escarpments[.]
    • 1957, Sidney Frederic Harmer, The Polyzoa of the Siboga Expedition, page 1106:
      Cellariiform, the orifices nearly confined to the convex frontal and lateral surfaces; the basal surface with a strong median calcareous keel, almost concealed by a flat membranous epitheca, which covers the whole zoarium […]
    • 2024 March 20, Chris Howe, “High speed underneath the Chilterns...”, in RAIL, number 1005, page 33:
      Instead, the spoil will be used in part to create 127 hectares of new calcareous grassland (alkaline grassland), woodland, wood pasture, and wetland habitats.
  2. (botany) Growing in a chalky habitat.

Derived terms

[edit]
[edit]

Translations

[edit]
Retrieved from "https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=calcareous&oldid=91016438"