Landscape
your Novel:
Hills & Mountains
Your protagonist finds themselves hiking up a hill, or is it a
mountain. What features will it have and can one word describe the features
without a long description?
To help in setting up your novel, or just out of curiosity, read
on and discover more about hills (or is it a mountain?)
According to the U.S. Geological Survey, there is no official
difference between hills and mountains. The United Kingdom and the United
States used to define them; however, both countries abandoned the distinction
in the mid-twentieth century.
Hills may form through geomorphic phenomena: faulting, erosion of
larger landforms, such as mountains and movement and deposition of sediment by
glaciers (e.g. moraines and drumlins or by erosion exposing solid rock which
then weathers down into a hill.) The rounded peaks of hills results from the
diffusive movement of soil and regolith covering the hill, a process known as
downhill creep.
The Himalayas in Asia, the tallest mountain range in the world,
were once tiny hills. The Himalayas continue to grow because of faulting
activity beneath the Earth’s surface.
Definitions:
Mound or
Tumulus
Sometimes, you'll find a hill made by people. This is called a
mound—area of raised earth above a grave or graves. In the Midwest region of
North America, a network of Native Americans known as the Hopewell created huge
mounds. In fact, the Hopewell people are often called Mound Builders. The most
well-known mounds are in Hopewell Culture National Historical Park, in the U.S.
state of Ohio. Artificial hills may be referred to by a variety of technical
names, including mound and tumulus.
Hillock
A hillock is a small
hill. Other words include knoll and
(in Scotland, Northern Ireland and northern England) its variant, knowe.
Drumlin Hill
A drumlin is a long hill, an elongated
whale-shape hill, formed by the
movement of glaciers. Also, during the Ice Age, glaciers covered the
area, mowing down the landscape as they advanced like steamrollers; removing all
the hills. The glaciers started to melt and running water from the melting
glaciers helped form the hilly, rugged landscape further south.
Butte or
Mesa
A butte or mesa are isolated hill with steep sides and a small
flat top, formed by weathering
Tor
A tor is a rock
formation on top of a hill. Sometimes,
especially in the United Kingdom, a tor also refers to the hill itself.
Puy
A puy is a
description used especially in the Auvergne, France, to describe a conical
volcanic hill.
Pingo
A pingo is a mound of ice covered with earth. These are found in the Arctic and Antarctica.
Kuppe
A Kuppe is a rounded hill or low mountain, typical of central
Europe
Plateau
A plateau is a flat
topped highland with steep sides. Plateaus are formed when magma pushes up
towards the surface of the earth’s crust. This magma does not break through but
it raises a portion of the crust up creating a plateau. There are certain kinds
of plateaus like the butte and the mesa. These are special kinds of
plateaus.
Tels
In ancient times, when one civilization conquered another the
invaders would tear down an old city and just build their new city on top of
the ruins. After hundreds of years of such processes, the result was a hill
made of layer upon layer of old city debris. Thousands of these hills, called tels, can be found in the Middle East.
Mountains
There are three types of Mountains
Volcanic mountains
Fold mountains
Block mountains
Surface water
“Mountains”
Archipelago
A large group of islands close to each other together form an
archipelago. The Lakshadweep islands are an example of an archipelago. The
largest archipelago in the world is Indonesia.
Peninsula
A peninsula is a piece of land that is surrounded by water from
three sides—the State of Florida
Cape
A cape is a part of land extending in to a water body
Isthmus
An isthmus is a narrow stretch of land which joins to large land
masses—Example the Isthmus of Panama.
Do you know of any others? Please add to the comments below.
