| Aeolian |
Aeolian plain |
Flat surface of accumulation of sands of various origins transformed by aeolian processes; it may occur as a cover or individual dune forms not fully developed. |
| Aeolian |
Loess plain |
Extensive, compact, flat or slightly wavy surface of loess accumulation with a thickness of > 10 m with small depressions without outflow (requirements), limited by slopes within which young erosive and erosive-denudative forms develop (ravines, gorges, gullies and ravines) and basin-shaped valleys. |
| Aeolian |
Moving dunes |
A field of active accumulation forms in the form of hills or embankments created as a result of accumulative wind activity, not fixed by vegetation. |
| Aeolian |
Stabilized dunes |
A field of inactive accumulation forms in the form of hills or embankments created as a result of the accumulative activity of the wind, fixed by vegetation. |
| Anthropogenic |
A group of small anthropogenic forms |
A set of small anthropogenic forms associated with near-surface exploitation (warpy and pinga, poor shafts), military activities (bomb craters) and others (barrows, mounds). |
| Anthropogenic |
Anthropogenic alignment |
The surface of the land levelled by man (e.g. under airports, parking lots, housing development, etc.). |
| Anthropogenic |
Anthropogenic water reservoir |
A concave form filled with water was created as a result of direct or indirect human activity (e.g. dam reservoir, retention reservoir, fire protection reservoir, breeding pond, floodplain in a subsidence basin, etc.). |
| Anthropogenic |
Canal |
An artificial ditch in the ground through which water flows continuously or intermittently (e.g. for irrigation, drainage, navigability, etc.). |
| Anthropogenic |
Dike |
The convex linear form was created by piling earth material along the river bank to protect the floodplains against flood waters. |
| Anthropogenic |
Embankment |
A convex linear form was created by piling up earth material (e.g. railway and road embankments, embankments). |
| Anthropogenic |
Excavations; outcrops |
Concave forms (e.g. quarry, gravel pit, sand pit, clay pit, etc.) resulting from mining activities; open pits are depressions formed as a result of the exposure of a mineral deposit from under the overburden and the exploitation of this deposit. |
| Anthropogenic |
Heaps |
Convex forms resulting from the accumulation of gangue, industrial waste, overburden or useful mineral (also in excavations and open pits, the so-called levelling or sublevel heaps). |
| Anthropogenic |
Indentation |
The concave linear form was created by the removal of earth material, not related to the exploitation of raw materials (e.g. road and railway cuts, trenches, trenches, deep holes, etc.). |
| Anthropogenic |
Regulated channel |
A riverbed formed by human activity (e.g. concreted, straightened, shifted, encased in fascine). |
| Anthropogenic |
Subsidence depression |
The concave form with sloping slopes was created as a result of subsidence of the land surface over underground mining excavations. |
| Denudative |
Denudation surface |
A flat or almost flat surface resulting from the levelling of the area by long-term denudation processes, may occur on mountain ridges, upland departments, within slopes, along larger river valleys and at the bottom of valleys; they occur in different hypsometric levels |
| Denudative |
Another resistance ridge |
An inter-valley form, built of rocks of high resistance, extracted by denudation processes from formations of low resistance; composed of igneous, metamorphic or sedimentary rocks arranged in plates. |
| Denudative |
Anticlinal resistance ridge |
An elongated inter-valley form, built of rocks of high resistance, extracted by denudation processes from formations of low resistance; founded in the axis of the anticline, with a course consistent with the course of the strata. |
| Denudative |
Erosion-denudation valley |
A form in the shape of a flat basin of large size; the bottom passes without a clear break into slopes culminating in rounded inter-valley divisions; there may be shallow indented troughs in the bottom. |
| Denudative |
Gully |
The valley is usually dry with a narrow bottom and uneven longitudinal profile, with a small slope of the bottom and steep, often precipitous slopes; depths from a few to 100 m; it is formed as a result of the erosive activity of rainwater and meltwater, cut in loess or other loose tracks. |
| Denudative |
Inselberg |
An isolated hill formed by selective denudation; growing above a flat or wavy denudation surface. |
| Denudative |
Landslide |
The form was created as a result of the gravitational displacement of the slope-building material along the slip surface; typical elements of a landslide are the detachment zone (landslide scarp) and the accumulation zone (landslide tongue with a head); can form landslide complexes. |
| Denudative |
Mid-mountain basin |
An extensive depression of a circular or elongated shape located in the mountains, surrounded on all sides by hills; has a flat or concave bottom; basins are formed in places with lower resistance of the bedrock, which may be conditioned by tectonics (tectonic sinkhole). |
| Denudative |
Monadnock |
A single elevation before a morphological threshold or plateau composed of sedimentary rocks, composed of the same rocks that make up the sill or plateau; Witness mountains reach a height of several to a hundred meters. |
| Denudative |
Monoclinal resistance ridge |
An elongated inter-valley form, built of rocks of high resistance, extracted by denudation processes from formations of low resistance; founded on the wings of the anticline and syncline, generally consistent with the course of the strata, asymmetric in cross-section with a steep slope on the fronts of the strata. |
| Denudative |
Neck |
An isolated dome or cone-shaped elevation made of volcanic rock with greater resistance than the surrounding rock, at the site of a former volcanic or subvolcanic vent. |
| Denudative |
Non-karst (tectonic) cave |
Natural emptiness in the rock accessible to humans (size criterion), was created mainly as a result of gravitational (landslide) or weathering processes. Developed usually along the surface of tectonic discontinuities, in rocks other than those undergoing karstification. |
| Denudative |
Other denudation thresholds and brinks |
Morphological thresholds separating flat or almost flat, extensive slope fragments lying below steeper slope fragments. The course of the threshold is not clearly determined by the tectonics, structure or resistance of the rocks. The threshold is the result of erosion-denudation processes. |
| Denudative |
Pass |
Lowering of the ridge line between two peaks; it is formed as a result of denudative processes in zones of lower rock resistance or as a result of bilateral retreat of source funnels. |
| Denudative |
Plateau |
Extensive, usually isolated elevation with a flat or undulating top; erosion-denudation genesis; bounded by more or less clear edges; conditioned by the structure and/or topography of the older subsoil; with possible superstructure of sediments of different origin and age. |
| Denudative |
Residual hill |
An elevation in the shape of an insulated dome, spire, cone, table or ridge prepared during long-term operation of denudation processes, |
| Denudative |
Resistance-independent ridge |
The inter-valley form, monadnock, was created as a result of the fragmentation of the area, with a slightly differentiated structure, occurring in the watershed areas that were destroyed last, with a course referring to the original slopes, usually inconsistent with the course of the rock layers. |
| Denudative |
Structural threshold - cuesta |
A threshold typical for areas with a monoclinal structure, asymmetrically cutting a ridge made of resistant rocks, forming layers tilted from the original horizontal arrangement. The face of the cuesta is inclined opposite to the slope of the layers and has an extension consistent with the course of the layers. The downslope (slope) has a lower slope than the sill face. |
| Denudative |
Synclinal resistance ridge |
An elongated inter-valley form, built of rocks of high resistance, extracted by denudation processes from formations of low resistance; inversion, with a course generally consistent with the axis of the syncline. |
| Denudative |
Threshold at the overthrust face |
Threshold along the boundary of the overthrust of tectonic units and subunits, usually composed of rock complexes with a different resistance to erosion-denudation processes than the unit overthrown. The base of the threshold is consistent with the course of the overthrust front. |
| Denudative |
Threshold determined by rock resistance |
A threshold created along the border of two rock complexes with different resistance to erosion and denudation processes; the base of the sill is generally consistent with the course of the lithological boundary, it can be rectilinear or tortuous depending on the nature of the contact; in less resistant rocks there is a prepared depression, more resistant rocks occupy a higher morphological position; typical lithological contacts: sedimentary and igneous rocks, especially extrusive ones, and rocks of contact metamorphism with igneous intrusion rocks; they reach up to 300 - 400 m high. |
| Denudative |
Top |
The highest part of a convex landform whose slopes meet at a single point at the top; it is formed as a result of intensive denudation processes following the weathering rate. |
| Denudative |
Tor |
An isolated rock outcrop, occurring in various morphological locations (top, ridge, slope, basin bottom). The shape results from various lithological and structural features of the rocks that build them. |
| Endogenous |
Tectonic horst |
The structural form was created by the uplift of a fragment of the earth's crust along two more or less parallel normal faults, less often inverted faults; height from 50 100 m to over 1000 m, length from several to several dozen kilometres; the morphological extent of the horsts is marked by tectonic thresholds, rectilinear in plan (at the base), but usually strongly dismembered by erosion and denudation processes; in the highest elevated part there may be a denudation surface with a slight inclination. |
| Endogenous |
The bottom of the tectonic trench and the mid-mountain depression |
The structural form was created by the relative lowering of a fragment of the earth's crust along faults parallel to each other in the case of tectonic trenches; in the case of mid-mountain sinkholes, the spatial arrangement of faults may be more complicated; the bottoms of ditches and sinkholes have a varied relief from flat to hilly; in the case of plain bottoms, they may be filled to varying degrees by sediments up to several hundred meters thick, originating from the denudation of neighbouring areas. |
| Endogenous |
High foothills |
The high foothills have a fluvial-denudation relief, they occur on the outskirts (in the foreground and inside) of medium and low mountains. The height differences range from 100 to 200 m. The slopes are convex-concave or straight. Larger valleys are flat-bottomed, smaller valleys. |
| Endogenous |
High mountains |
High mountains have features of high-mountain relief, mainly glacial (alpine), shaped by mountain glaciers. They contain a complex of erosion and accumulation forms, such as glacial cauldrons and gullies, ridges of terminal and lateral moraines. The bottoms of the valleys are filled with glacial and fluvioglacial material. The height differences exceed 800 m. The ridges vary from sharp, ridge-like to wide, rounded. The slopes are steep (>30 o), straight or convex - concave. There are walls and rock slopes with dump slopes at the foot. |
| Endogenous |
Highlands – higher level |
Hilly hills with denivelations above 50 m and slopes above 15°; poorly dissected and dismembered; fragments of denudation flattenings have been preserved at the culminations of the hills and within the slopes. |
| Endogenous |
Highlands - lower level |
Hilly hills, with denivelations below 50 m and slopes below 15°; strongly dissected; fragments of denudation flattenings have been preserved at the culminations of the hills and within the slopes. |
| Endogenous |
Low foothills |
The low foothills have a fluvial-denudation relief, for which wide humps are typical. They are usually separated by flat-bottomed valleys with convex-concave, less often convex, slopes with inclinations usually not exceeding 10°. The height differences do not exceed 100 m. |
| Endogenous |
Low mountains |
The low mountains have a fluvial-denudation relief. They are often formed by isolated monadnocks. The height differences range from 200 to 400 m. The slopes are steep, convex or straight. Larger valleys are flat-bottomed, smaller valleys. |
| Endogenous |
Medium mountains |
Medium mountains have a fluvial-denudation relief. The outlier ridges rise to the height above 2000 msea level. The ridges have various shapes and spatial arrangements. Fragments of different ages of old denudation surfaces of various sizes can be preserved on the plateau and within the slopes. The height differences range from 400 to 800 m. The slopes are steep (>20 o), covered with weathering covers. The mountain groups are divided by deep valleys with steep straight or convex slopes. The bottoms of large valleys have terrace levels of various ages. The smaller valleys are notches. |
| Endogenous |
Tectonic threshold |
The fault of tectonic origin is formed as a result of vertical displacements along normal or inverted faults, generally maintaining a rectilinear course. The upper fracture is usually discontinuous due to erosion-denudative processes, while the lower one remains distinct and separates the flat or undulating surface on the shed flank of the fault from the slope formed along the fault surface, which may be preserved in the form of triangular faces. |
| Endogenous |
Upland water divide within the depression |
Low elevations and ridges, separating extensive depressions (valleys) with a varied relief within the uplands. |
| Fluvial |
V-shaped valley |
A large, mature elongated form formed as a result of fluvial processes in loose rocks and less resistant solid rocks with weathered cover; a distinguishing feature is the V-shaped transverse profile of the valley. |
| Fluvial |
Flat-bottomed valley |
A valley with a valley bottom and slopes formed as a result of erosion and/or accumulative river processes, constituting the bottom of a valley with any channel layout. |
| Fluvial |
Alluvial fan |
A form similar to a fan, it was created at the mouth of the valley or in the vast foreground of the mountains and foothills in the place of a clear break in the slope of the channel. |
| Fluvial |
Estuary |
The lower (end) fragment of a funnel-shaped river channel flowing into a lake or the sea. |
| Fluvial |
Floodplain terrace (plain) |
A flat surface along the river bed, formed by accumulative river processes within the bottom of a river valley periodically flooded by flood waters; |
| Fluvial |
Hidden delta |
An accumulative form in the form of a fan or a plain was created within a river valley, leveling the course of the shoreline of a lake or sea. |
| Fluvial |
Meadow terrace |
A flat surface along a river channel, formed by accumulative or erosive river processes; it occurs up to several levels above the modern flood plain (plain) without being flooded or flooded by flood waters. |
| Fluvial |
Oxbow lake |
Former fragment of an alluvial channel filled with water and/or mineral and organic sediments on the floodplain; a depression in the surface of the floodplain in the shape of a meander resulting from the cutting of the meander neck by flood waters or (rarely) anthropogenic straightening of the channel; periodically there may be a flow of flood waters or it may be flooded with flood waters, leaving sandy covers and/or a silt coating. |
| Fluvial |
Proluvial plain |
The extensive, slightly sloping surface, stretching at the base of the hills, was formed as a result of denudation-fluvial accumulation, in places remodelled by aeolian processes. |
| Fluvial |
River gap |
A section of a river valley with a narrow, deeply cut bottom compared to the upstream and downstream sections of the river valley and the areas surrounding the valley. |
| Fluvial |
Terrace edge |
Linear form separating adjacent terrace levels. |
| Fluvial |
Waterfall threshold |
A rock form that is a high, very steep, vertical or overhanging fragment of the bottom of a river channel. |
| Glacial |
Moraine plateau |
A vast post-glacial surface with height differences 5 m and an inclination of up to 5°, built of subglacial moraine clays, with or without a cover of ablation sediments. |
| Glacial |
The edge of the moraine plateau |
Morphological edge of different origin separating the hypsometric levels within the moraine plateau. |
| Glacial |
A winding glacial ridge (???) |
A winding embankment with an uneven ridge line, up to several meters high, up to several kilometres wide 200 m and up to several kilometres long; a set of parallel embankments formed as a result of cutting the ground by subglacial meltwaters with high flow energy. |
| Glacial |
An older form with subglacial transformation |
Post-glacial forms of various morphology and origin crossed and remodelled by the ice sheet, partially preserving the features of the original forms. |
| Glacial |
Dead-ice moraine |
Mounds, hills, embankments built mostly of loams squeezed in ice crevices or loams, clay deposits deposited in stagnant/dead ice interstices. |
| Glacial |
Esker |
A narrow, winding embankment or a series of hills with an uneven ridge line, from several hundred meters to several dozen kilometres long and up to several dozen meters high, built of sands and gravels deposited by water flowing in tunnels or glacier crevices. |
| Glacial |
Frontal moraine |
A hill or series of hills and hills formed along the front of a glacier/glacier as a result of the accumulation of material melting from the edge of a glacier/ice sheet or by the pressing or pushing of sediments in front of its front. |
| Glacial |
Glacial cirque; U-shaped valley |
A large semicircular or elongated depression surrounded by steep rock slopes and a U-shaped valley with an uneven longitudinal profile and steep, sometimes smoothed rock slopes, created as a result of glacial erosion. |
| Glacial |
Glacial trough |
A longitudinal depression, up to several kilometres wide and tens of meters deep, with steep edges and an uneven bottom, usually filled with lake waters or biogenic sediments, created as a result of subglacial meltwater cutting the ground. |
| Glacial |
Glaciolacustrine plain |
A flat accumulation surface built of fine sediments, most often clays, deposited in marginal or proglacial lakes, formed as a result of stemming the outflow of meltwater or river waters. |
| Glacial |
Hillock moraine |
Groups of irregular hills and ridges with numerous drainless depressions, formed as a result of the melting of stagnant/dead ice. |
| Glacial |
Ice contact edge |
A clear morphological edge was created as a result of the accumulation of sands and gravels by meltwater at the contact with the front of the ice sheet during its longer standstill. |
| Glacial |
Kames; kame terraces |
Hills and hills, composed of gravels, sands and silts, embedded in crevices of stagnant or dead ice, and narrow sandy-gravel surfaces formed between the edge of a glacier and the slope of another form. |
| Glacial |
Kettle-hole |
Closed depressions, often filled with lake waters or biogenic sediments, formed as a result of melting of a buried patch or block of dead ice. |
| Glacial |
Marginal valley (pradolina) |
A meltwater valley formed by meltwater (subglacial, proglacial) flowing parallel to the glacier front. |
| Glacial |
Megadunes of outbrust floods (???) |
Sets of parallel embankments on the surface of sandurs formed as a result of the accumulation of sands and gravels during catastrophic flows of glacial waters. |
| Glacial |
Outwash fan |
A fan-shaped accumulation of sands and gravels brought by meltwater at the mouth of a glacier tunnel, usually with a flat or slightly convex surface inclined in the direction of water flow. |
| Glacial |
Outwash plain; outwash strip |
An extensive or narrow flat surface composed of sands and gravels deposited by proglacial meltwater flowing away from the front of the ice sheet. |
| Glacial |
Pradolina terrace |
Flat accumulation surface created as a result of erosive and accumulative activity of proglacial and extraglacial waters. |
| Glacial |
Proglacial valley |
A meltwater valley formed by proglacial meltwater flowing away from a glacier front. |
| Glacial |
Ribbed moraine (???) |
Sets of parallel shafts or rows of hills and hills perpendicular to the direction of ice movement, formed as a result of subglacial processes of deformation and clay accumulation. |
| Glacial |
Stream form (???) |
Mounds and hills as well as long, rectilinear and parallel shafts, elongated in the direction of ice movement, testifying to the rapid movement of ice, formed subglacially as a result of ground erosion and accumulation of moraine clays, with the participation of ice pressure and meltwater activity. |
| Glacial |
Terminal depression |
Extensive, usually not too deep depression of the terrain behind the arc of terminal moraines or recessions, formed as a result of exatation and subsequent melting of stagnant/dead ice. |
| Glacial |
Valley floor with moraine and fluvioglacial cover |
Accumulation surface in the bottom of a glacial valley made of rock material melted on the surface of a glacier (supraglacial) and coarse-grained sediments deposited by meltwater. |
| Karst |
Karst cave |
Natural empty space in the rock accessible to humans (size criterion), was created as a result of dissolution and water erosion processes in karst rocks. |
| Karst |
Karst depression |
Various sizes, basin-shaped or trough-shaped, polygenic depression (e.g. field, basin, embankment, float, glaciokarst basin) formed in areas built of karst rocks. |
| Karst |
Karst valley |
A valley in a karst area (mainly limestone and gypsum karst) without a permanent surface water flow due to well-developed underground drainage (blind, half-blind and dry valley) or with an existing surface water flow as a result of poorly developed underground drainage; this drainage is developed at the level of the valley floor (ravine and karst canyon). |
| Karst |
Sinkhole |
Sets of funnel-shaped or basin-shaped depressions (including vertebrae) formed as a result of the dissolution of karst rocks, collapse of cave ceilings or reproduction in loose sediments (e.g. post-glacial) covering these rocks. |
| Littoral |
Cliff coast |
A very steep or vertical sea shore built of post-glacial formations, currently undercut by waves of sea (lake) waters and transformed by slope processes. |
| Littoral |
Coastal plain |
Flat accumulation surface formed by littoral processes; there may often be shallow depressions and small elevations of various sizes. |
| Littoral |
Flat coast |
An elongated, wide form, usually accumulative, was created as a result of the coastal emergence, immersion of the coastal plain, along which the beach is built up. |
| Littoral |
Lake plain |
A flat accumulation surface created as a result of the disappearance of a lake basin, most often by filling it with mineral and/ or organogenic sediments. |
| Littoral |
Retrogressive delta |
The extensive accumulation form in the form of a wet plain was created as a result of the interaction of fluvial and littoral processes with the dominant share of sea water inflows into the lagoon. |
| Littoral |
Spit |
Accumulation forms formed by littoral processes along the shore, built of sandy or gravel material; blackbirds grow towards the open sea; spits separate a bay or lagoon from the open sea. |
| Organogenic |
Biogenic Plain |
The flat surface was created as a result of the accumulation of organic sediments (usually gyttja, peat) in older subsoil depressions with different morphogenesis. |
| Periglacial |
Periglacial denudation plain |
A levelled surface formed by the denudation of an older relief (e.g. glacial, fluvioglacial, fluvial-denudative, aeolian) under periglacial conditions. |