| 释义 |
culmination|kʌlmɪˈneɪʃən|
[n. of action from culminate v.; cf. F. culmination.]
1. The attainment by a heavenly body of its greatest altitude; the act of reaching the meridian.
lower culmination or upper culmination: the attainment of least or greatest altitude on any day.
1633Gellibrand in T. James Voy. R iij, At the instant of the Moones Culmination or Mediation of Heauen. 1788Smeaton in Phil. Trans. LXXIX. 2 Adjustment..to answer the culmination of any of the heavenly bodies. 1856Kane Arct. Expl. I. viii. 79 The sun's lower culmination, if such a term can be applied to his midnight depression.
2. fig. The attainment of the highest point, or state of being at the height; concr. that in which anything culminates, the crown or consummation.
1657A. Farindon Serm. 429 (T.) We..wonder how that which in its putting forth was a flower, should in its growth and culmination become a thistle. 1844Emerson Lect. Yng. Amer. Wks. (Bohn) II. 296 The uprise and culmination of the new..power of Commerce. 1865Lecky Ration. (1878) I. 253 This fresco may be regarded as the culmination of the movement.
3. The raising of the level of the land on either side of a river by allowing flood-water to deposit silt on it. [Cf. It. colmare vb.]
1838F. Maceroni Mem. II. 62 The process of culmination is particularly successful if practised high up a river much liable to winter floods.
4. Geol.
a. (Also culmination of pitch.) A part of a fold, esp. a nappe, where the strata were at their highest before they were eroded.
b. An axis of a system of folds joining the highest parts of successive folds.
1927L. W. Collet Struct. Alps ii. i. 27 Windows generally originate..on culminations of pitch. Ibid., The windows of the Lower Engadine and of the Tauern are due to culminations of the substratum. 1942M. P. Billings Struct. Geol. iii. 49 Culminations and depressions trend essentially at right angles to the trend of the folds; the folds plunge away from culminations toward depressions. 1944A. Holmes Princ. Phys. Geol. xviii. 392 The nappes..are found to undulate up and down in an alternating succession of broad culminations and depressions. 1965Ibid. (ed. 2) xxx. 1157 (caption) Mt. Blanc (15,782 feet) the highest culmination of the Hercynian massifs. 1966McGraw-Hill Encycl. Sci. & Technol. XIII. 408/1 In the culminations, where the higher strata have been removed by erosion, the structure of the lower strata may be seen in the deep valleys. |