overburden
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English
[edit]Alternative forms
[edit]Etymology
[edit]Verb
[edit]overburden (third-person singular simple present overburdens, present participle overburdening, simple past and past participle overburdened)
- To overload or overtax.
- 2023 January 11, Paul Stephen, “Network News: Division over 5.9% increase in regulated rail fares”, in RAIL, number 974, page 16:
- He said the increase would avoid overburdening taxpayers who have subsidised the railways by £31 billion since the start of the Coronavirus pandemic.
Translations
[edit]to overload or overtax
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Noun
[edit]overburden (plural overburdens)
- (geology) The rock and subsoil that lies above a mineral deposit such as a coal seam, or any other underground feature.
- Synonym: mullock
- 1953 January, “Notes and News: Arley Tunnel, L.M.R.”, in Railway Magazine, page 61:
- Before much progress was made with the inverts, however, the movement became accelerated, and it was decided to lighten the load over the tunnel by removing some of the soil, […] . This reduction in the overburden arrested the movement, and the inverting and centring were completed, and the tunnel opened again to traffic on April 9, 1949.
- 2004, Richard Fortey, The Earth, Folio Society, published 2011, page 163:
- Such rocks have been changed by baking in a terrestrial pressure-cooker. Then they have been disinterred: kilometres of overburden must have been removed.
- (archaeology) A sterile stratum that lies above the stratum being investigated