orogeny

May. 29th, 2019 07:49 am
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[personal profile] prettygoodword
orogeny (aw-ROJ-uh-nee) - n., the process of mountain formation, especially by folding or faulting of the earth's crust.


That last clause to distinguish it from large areas lifted up without wrinkling, forming broad plateaus by epeirogeny. (You can forget that last word unless you're a geologist, in which case you already knew it anyway.) Orogeny is one of those lovely to say words that unfortunately doesn't have much metaphoric applications and limited reason to use. It was imported in 1890 by American geologyst G. K. Gilbert from French orogénie, where it was coined from Greek roots óros, mountain + geneia, creation/birth. One way of orogeny:

Mountains in the middle
Thanks, WikiMedia!

---L.

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