Gneiss in the context of "Hillock"

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⭐ Core Definition: Gneiss

Gneiss (/ns/ NYSE) is a common and widely distributed type of metamorphic rock. It is formed by high-temperature and high-pressure metamorphic processes acting on formations composed of igneous or sedimentary rocks. This rock is formed under pressures ranging from 2 to 15 kbar, sometimes even more, and temperatures over 300 °C (572 °F). Gneiss nearly always shows a banded texture characterized by alternating darker and lighter colored bands and without a distinct cleavage.

Gneisses are common in the ancient crust of continental shields. Some of the oldest rocks on Earth are gneisses, such as the Acasta Gneiss.

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👉 Gneiss in the context of Hillock

A hillock or knoll is a small hill, usually separated from a larger group of hills such as a range. Hillocks are similar in their distribution and size to small mesas or buttes. This particular formation occurs often in Great Britain and China. A similar type of landform in the Scandinavian countries goes by the name "kulle" or "bakke" (depending on the country) and is contrary to the above phenomena formed when glaciers polish down hard, crystalline bedrock of gneiss or granites, leaving a rounded rocky hillock with sparse vegetation.

One of the most famous knolls is the one near John F. Kennedy's point of assassination, the grassy knoll, in Dealey Plaza of downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the source of many prominent conspiracy theories regarding the circumstances of his assassination.

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Gneiss in the context of Saana

Saana (Northern Sami: Sána) is a fell in Enontekiö, Finland. Saana's summit lies 1,029 metres (3,376 ft) above sea level and 556 m (1,824 ft) above the adjacent Kilpisjärvi lake. Geologically it is part of the Scandinavian Mountains, and is made of the same kinds of schist and gneiss rock. The peak is a popular destination for hikers and backpackers because of the sweeping views offered at the summit.

In December 2017, in celebration of the 100th anniversary of Finland's independence, Saana was lit with blue light. The area illuminated covered roughly 2.5 million square meters, making it the largest art illumination in the world.

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Gneiss in the context of Khafre Enthroned

Khafre Enthroned is a Ka statue of the pharaoh Khafre, who reigned during the Fourth Dynasty of ancient Egypt. It is now located in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. Made of anorthosite gneiss, a valuable, extremely hard, and dark stone, it was brought 1,000 km (620 mi) down the Nile River from the "Khafre quarries" west of Gebel el-Asr. The statue was carved for the Pharaoh's valley temple near the Great Sphinx, a part of the necropolis used in funeral rituals.

This sculpture, depicted in-the-round (versus relief sculpture), shows Khafre seated, one of the basic formulaic types used during the Old Kingdom to show the human figure. Mummification played a huge role in the Egyptian culture, a 70-day process to ensure immortality for the king. Starting in the 3rd millennium BCE, if the king's mummy was damaged, a ka statue was created to "ensure immortality and permanence of the deceased's identity by providing a substitute dwelling place for the ka".

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Gneiss in the context of Basement (geology)

In geology, basement and crystalline basement are crystalline rocks lying above the mantle and beneath all other rocks and sediments. They are sometimes exposed at the surface, but often they are buried under miles of rock and sediment. The basement rocks lie below a sedimentary platform or cover, or more generally any rock below sedimentary rocks or sedimentary basins that are metamorphic or igneous in origin. In the same way, the sediments or sedimentary rocks on top of the basement can be called a "cover" or "sedimentary cover".

Basement rock consists of continental crustal rock which has been modified several times through tectonic events including deformation, metamorphism, deposition, partial melting and magmatism.

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Gneiss in the context of Inselberg

An inselberg or monadnock (/məˈnædnɒk/ mə-NAD-nok) is an isolated rock hill, knob, ridge, or small mountain that rises abruptly from a gently sloping or virtually level surrounding plain.If the inselberg is dome-shaped and formed from granite or gneiss, it can also be called a bornhardt, though not all bornhardts are inselbergs. An inselberg results when a body of rock resistant to erosion, such as granite, occurring within a body of softer rocks, is exposed by differential erosion and lowering of the surrounding landscape.

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Gneiss in the context of Aspromonte

The Aspromonte is a mountain massif in the Metropolitan City of Reggio Calabria (Calabria, southern Italy). In Italian aspro means "rough" whereas in Greek it means "white" (Άσπρος), therefore the name literally translates to either "rough mountain" or "white mountain". It overlooks the Strait of Messina, being limited by the Ionian and Tyrrhenian Seas and by the Pietrace river. The highest peak is Montalto (1,955 m (6,414 ft)). The constituting rocks are mostly gneiss, and mica schists, which form characteristic overlapping terraces. The massif is part of the Aspromonte National Park.

In the short coastal strip citrus fruits, vine and olives are grown, while at high elevations the vegetation is composed mostly by oak and holm oak under 1,000 m (3,300 ft), and by pine, Sicilian fir and beech over it. Olive trees grow in abundance. Also, the rare bergamot, the lemony-yellow fruit used in perfumes and flavouring for Earl Grey tea, only grows in the southern Aspromonte.

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Gneiss in the context of Mont Blanc massif

The Mont Blanc massif (French: Massif du Mont-Blanc [masif dy mɔ̃ blɑ̃]; Italian: Massiccio del Monte Bianco) is a mountain range in the Alps, located mostly in France and Italy, but also straddling Switzerland at its northeastern end. It contains eleven major independent summits, each over 4,000 metres (13,123 ft) in height. It is named after Mont Blanc (4,808 metres (15,774 ft)), the highest point in western Europe and the European Union. Because of its considerable overall altitude, a large proportion of the massif is covered by glaciers, which include the Mer de Glace and the Miage Glacier – the longest glaciers in France and Italy, respectively.

The massif forms a watershed between the vast catchments of the rivers Rhône and Po, and a tripoint between France, Italy and Switzerland; it also marks the border between two climate regions by separating the northern and western Alps from the southern Alps. The mountains of the massif consist mostly of granite and gneiss rocks and at high altitudes the vegetation is an arctic-alpine flora.

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Gneiss in the context of Aiguilles Rouges

The Aiguilles Rouges (French pronunciation: [ɛɡɥij ʁuʒ], "Red Needles") are a crystalline mountainous massif of the French Prealps, opposite the Mont Blanc Massif. The colour of the iron-rich gneiss (metamorphique) mountains gives the range its name. The highest summit is the Aiguille du Belvédère at 2,965 metres (9,728 ft). At the southern end of the range, Le Brévent at 2,525 metres (8,284 ft) is accessible by a cable car in the Planpraz and the Brévent sections.

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Gneiss in the context of Foliation (geology)

Foliation in geology refers to repetitive layering in metamorphic rocks. Each layer can be as thin as a sheet of paper, or over a meter in thickness. The word comes from the Latin folium, meaning "leaf", and refers to the sheet-like planar structure. It is caused by shearing forces (pressures pushing different sections of the rock in different directions), or differential pressure (higher pressure from one direction than in others). The layers form parallel to the direction of the shear, or perpendicular to the direction of higher pressure. Nonfoliated metamorphic rocks are typically formed in the absence of significant differential pressure or shear. Foliation is common in rocks affected by the regional metamorphic compression typical of areas of mountain belt formation (orogenic belts).

More technically, foliation is any penetrative planar fabric present in metamorphic rocks. Rocks exhibiting foliation include the standard sequence formed by the prograde metamorphism of mudrocks; slate, phyllite, schist and gneiss. The slatey cleavage typical of slate is due to the preferred orientation of microscopic phyllosilicate crystals. In gneiss, the foliation is more typically represented by compositional banding due to segregation of mineral phases. Foliated rock is also known as S-tectonite in sheared rock masses.

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