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Cirque. A cirque (French: [siʁk]; from the Latin word circus) is an amphitheatre -like valley formed by glacial erosion. Alternative names for this landform are corrie (from Scottish Gaelic: coire, meaning a pot or cauldron) [1] and cwm (Welsh for 'valley'; pronounced [kʊm]). A cirque may also be a similarly shaped landform arising from ...
Glacial landform. Glacial landforms are landforms created by the action of glaciers. Most of today's glacial landforms were created by the movement of large ice sheets during the Quaternary glaciations. Some areas, like Fennoscandia and the southern Andes, have extensive occurrences of glacial landforms; other areas, such as the Sahara, display ...
Pyramidal peak. The Matterhorn, a classic example of a pyramidal peak. A pyramidal peak, sometimes called a glacial horn in extreme cases, is an angular, sharply pointed mountain peak which results from the cirque erosion due to multiple glaciers diverging from a central point. Pyramidal peaks are often examples of nunataks.
Cirque glacier. A cirque glacier is formed in a cirque, a bowl-shaped depression on the side of or near mountains. Snow and ice accumulation in corries often occurs as the result of avalanching from higher surrounding slopes. If a cirque glacier advances far enough, it may become a valley glacier. Additionally, if a valley glacier retreats ...
Striding Edge, an arête viewed from Helvellyn with the corrie Red Tarn to the left and Nethermost Cove to the right. An arête (/ əˈrɛt / ə-RET; French: [aʁɛt]) [1] is a narrow ridge of rock that separates two valleys. It is typically formed when two glaciers erode parallel U-shaped valleys. Arêtes can also form when two glacial cirques ...
Erosion of the rocky massif filled the basins with sediment. Glacial action in the Quaternary (1.8 mya to present) finished shaping the Peñalara cirque and the walls of the mountainous axis. The cirques were covered by a mantle of ice up to 300 m thick. [2] Later, the confluence of the rivers gave the final touch to the landscape.
The valley is about 6 kilometers (3.7 mi) long and has the most characteristic glacial features in its upper half. Below Cold Mountain in the southwest part of the valley there are well-formed cirques. The eastern ridge above the valley consists of solid dolomite.
These include the features around Llyn y Fan Fach and Llyn Cwm Llwch, both of which lakes occupy glacially excavated rock hollows or cirques. Glacial erratics are common, the most obvious being those of Old Red Sandstone perched on various of the limestone pavements which lie to the south of the sandstone outcrops.