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Cretaceous   /krɪtˈeɪʃɪs/   Listen
Cretaceous

noun
1.
From 135 million to 63 million years ago; end of the age of reptiles; appearance of modern insects and flowering plants.  Synonym: Cretaceous period.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Cretaceous" Quotes from Famous Books



... recognition of the changes connected with the Periods. As I shall have occasion hereafter to enter into this subject more at length, I will only allude briefly here to the circumstances. In so doing I am anticipating the true geological order, because I must treat of the Jurassic and Cretaceous deposits, which are still far in advance of us; but as it was by the study of these deposits that the circumscription of the Periods, as I have defined them above, was first ascertained, I must allude to them ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... that period in years. The relative duration is clear, tho the absolute duration may not be definable. The attempt to affix any precise date to the period at which the chalk sea began or ended its existence is baffled by difficulties of the same kind. But the relative age of the cretaceous epoch may be determined with as great ease and certainty as the long ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VI (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland IV • Various

... broken by them are the slates, conglomerates and calcareous rocks which are found in the mountains and over the whole surface of the island. The character of the central range and the inclination of the strata of cretaceous rocks make it probable that the island emerged from the sea in the eocene period, its area being then confined to the extent of the central mountain chain, with a few small islands to the south, one ...
— Santo Domingo - A Country With A Future • Otto Schoenrich

... there any authority on earth (always excepting the Dean of Christ Church) which could make it credible to me. I am sick of Mr. Canning. There is not a 'ha'porth of bread to all this sugar and sack.' I love not the cretaceous and incredible countenance of his colleague. The only opinion in which I agree with these two gentlemen is that which they entertain of each other. I am sure that the insolence of Mr. Pitt, and the unbalanced ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury

... geological strata, the whole series of cretaceous formations have to be passed through before reaching the Oolite formation, of which the Kimeridge clay forms almost the upper layer. But at Woodhall and the surrounding district the whole of this series of rocks and ...
— Records of Woodhall Spa and Neighbourhood - Historical, Anecdotal, Physiographical, and Archaeological, with Other Matter • J. Conway Walter

... in their company, they seemed quite unable to form any such plan now. They descended in all directions down the hill, and straightway several of the party fell into the snare set by Nature for all misguided midnight ramblers over this part of the cretaceous formation. The 'lanchets,' or flint slopes, which belted the escarpment at intervals of a dozen yards, took the less cautious ones unawares, and losing their footing on the rubbly steep they slid sharply downwards, the lanterns rolling from their hands to the bottom, and there lying on their ...
— Wessex Tales • Thomas Hardy

... hills almost bare of trees, a dreary track to cross at any time, but especially detestable when the dust lies thick upon the white road and the summer sun is blazing overhead. But how delightful is the contrast when, going down at length from these cretaceous uplands, where even the potato plants look as if they had been whitewashed, you see below the verdant valley of the Dronne, that seems to be blessed with eternal spring, the gay flash of the winding ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker

... many thousand tons, and of which at least eighty per cent. was once associated with animal life. And such, I doubt not, is the history of many a calcareous rock in the later secondary formations. There are strata, not a few, of the Cretaceous and Oolitic groups, that would be found—could we but trace their beginnings with a certainty and clearness equal to that with which we can unravel the story of this deposit—to be, like it, elaborations from dead matter, made through ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller



Words linked to "Cretaceous" :   Mesozoic era, chalk, period, geological period, Age of Reptiles, Mesozoic



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