limestone

See also: Limestone

English

Etymology

From lime +‎ stone.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈlaɪmˌstoʊn/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈlaɪmˌstəʊn/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aɪmstəʊn

Noun

limestone (countable and uncountable, plural limestones)

1. An abundant rock of marine and freshwater sediments; primarily composed of calcite (CaCO₃); and occurring in a variety of forms, both crystalline and amorphous.

   a limestone viaduct

   • 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter I, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:

     The house was a big elaborate limestone affair, evidently new. Winter sunshine sparkled on lace-hung casement, on glass marquise, and the burnished bronze foliations of grille and door.

   • 1939 July, “What the Railways are Doing: The New Ebbw Vale Steelworks”, in Railway Magazine, page 68:

     As each blast furnace uses 200 tons of limestone daily, and each limestone kiln 150 tons, a total of 730 tons of limestone has to be carried daily, in addition to limestone chippings, which are sold.

   • 2024 November 19, Nicola Venning, “Welcome to the Notswolds”, in Country Life‎^[1], archived from the original on 14 May 2025:

     Rutland (and some of the bordering ‘Notswolds’ counties of Lincolnshire, Leicestershire and Northamptonshire) have the same mellow, creamy limestone as the Cotswolds and boast beguiling market towns and villages that are every bit as attractive, but without the tourists or hefty prices.

Synonyms

• lime
• calcium carbonate

Hyponyms

• (mineralogy): bluestone, burrstone, calp, coquina, coral rag, chalk, malm, marble, travertine, tufa

Derived terms

• honeycomb limestone
• hydraulic limestone
• Limestone Coast
• Limestone County
• limestone hawksbeard
• limestone pavement
• limestone salamander
• lithographic limestone
• magnesian limestone
• mountain limestone
• scar limestone

Translations

abundant rock of marine and fresh-water sediments

• Albanian: gur gëlqeror m
• Arabic: حَجَر جِيرِيّ m (ḥajar jīriyy), حَجَر كِلْسِيّ m (ḥajar kilsiyy)
• Armenian: կրաքար (hy) (krakʻar)
• Azerbaijani: əhəngdaşı (az)
• Basque: kareharri inan
• Belarusian: вапня́к m (vapnják)
• Bengali: ঘুটিং (bn) (ghuṭiṅ)
• Bulgarian: варо́вик (bg) (varóvik)
• Burmese: ထုံးကျောက် (my) (htum:kyauk)
• Catalan: pedra calcària
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 石灰岩 (zh) (shíhuīyán), 灰岩 (huīyán), 青石 (zh) (qīngshí) (colloquial)

• Czech: vápenec (cs) m
• Danish: kalksten (da) c
• Dutch: kalksteen (nl) n
• Esperanto: kalkoŝtono (eo)
• Estonian: lubjakivi
• Finnish: kalkkikivi (fi), kalkki (fi)
• French: calcaire (fr) m
• Galician: calcaria (gl) f
• Georgian: კირქვა (ḳirkva)
• German: Kalkstein (de) m, Calciumcarbonat (de) n, Kalk (de) m
• Greek: ασβεστόλιθος (el) m (asvestólithos)
• Hebrew: גִּיר (he) m (gir), אֶבֶן גִּיר f (even gir)
• Hindi: चूना पत्थर m (cūnā patthar)
• Hungarian: mészkő (hu)
• Icelandic: kalksteinn (is)
• Indonesian: batu kapur (id)
• Ingrian: kalkki, kalkkikivi
• Irish: aolchloch f, cloch aoil f
• Italian: calcare (it) m
• Japanese: 石灰岩 (ja) (せっかいがん, sekkaigan)
• Kazakh: әктас (kk) (äktas)
• Khmer: ថ្មកំបោរ (thmɑɑ kɑmbao), កំបោរថ្ម (kɑmbao thmɑɑ)
• Korean: 석회암(石灰岩) (ko) (seokhoeam), 석회석(石灰石) (ko) (seokhoeseok)
• Kyrgyz: акиташ (ky) (akitaş)
• Lao: ຫິນປູນ (hin pūn)
• Latin: calx f
• Latvian: kaļķakmens m
• Lithuanian: klintis m
• Macedonian: варовник m (varovnik)
• Malay: batu kapur
• Māori: pākeho
• Mongolian:

  Cyrillic: шохойн чулуу (šoxojn čuluu)

• Nahuatl:

  Classical Nahuatl: tenextetl

• Norman: pièrre dé caux f (Jersey)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: kalkstein m

  Nynorsk: kalkstein m

• Occitan: calcari (oc) m, calquièr m
• Persian: سنگ آهک (sang âhak)
• Pitjantjatjara: arpata
• Plautdietsch: Kaulkjsteen n
• Polish: wapień (pl) m
• Portuguese: calcário (pt) m
• Romanian: calcar (ro) n
• Russian: известня́к (ru) m (izvestnják)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: кре̏чња̄к m, вапне́нац m

  Latin: krȅčnjāk (sh) m, vapnénac (sh) m

• Slovak: vápenec (sk) m
• Slovene: apnenec (sl) m
• Spanish: caliza (es) f
• Swedish: kalksten (sv) c
• Tajik: оҳаксанг (ohaksang)
• Tatar: известьташ (izwestʹtaş)
• Thai: หินปูน (th) (hǐn-bpuun)
• Tibetan: རྡོ་ཐལ་རྡོ (rdo thal rdo), རྡོ་ཐལ་བྲག (rdo thal brag)
• Turkish: kireç taşı (tr); küfeki (tr) (fossiliferous limestone)
• Turkmen: hek daşy
• Ukrainian: вапня́к (uk) m (vapnják)
• Urdu: چونا پتھر m (cūnā patthar)
• Uyghur: ھاك تېشى (hak tëshi)
• Uzbek: ohaktosh (uz)
• Vietnamese: đá vôi (vi)
• Welsh: calchfaen (cy) m, carreg galch f

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

• Bulgarian: варо́вик (bg) m (varóvik)
• Dutch: kalkstenen (nl)
• Finnish: kalkkikivinen, kalkkikivi- (fi)
• Galician: calcario (gl) m, calcaria (gl) f
• German: Kalk- (de)
• Polish: wapienny (pl)
• Portuguese: calcário (pt) m, calcária f
• Spanish: calizo (es) m, caliza (es) f
• Tagalog: batong-apog
• Tibetan: རྡོ་ཐལ་གྱི (rdo thal gyi), རྡོ་ཐལ་རྡོའི (rdo thal rdo'i)
• Welsh: calch (cy), calchfaen (cy)

See also

• karst

Anagrams

• lemoniest, milestone