Synonyms
Bank; Beachfront; Coast; Lakeshore; Lakeside; Littoral; Margin; Oceanfront; Seaboard; Seafront; Seashore; Seaside; Shingle; Shore; Strand; Waterfront
Definition
In the most rudimentary sense, a beach may be considered a shore (see Coasts) covered by sand (e.g., Shepard, 1973), gravel (e.g., Carter and Orford, 1984; Jennings and Shulmeister, 2002), or larger rock fragments (but lacking bare rock surfaces). More specifically, Jackson (1997) defines a beach as a relatively thick and transitory accumulation of loose waterborne materials that are mostly well-sorted sand and pebbles, but contains admixtures of mud, cobbles, boulders, smoothed rock, and shell fragments. The term was originally used in a scientific sense to designate loose waterworn shingle or pebbles on English shores (Johnson, 1919). Today, beaches are defined in a wider geomorphological sense as having subaerial and submarine components that are systematically interrelated. The beach system includes the dry...
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Finkl, C.W. (2016). Beach. In: Harff, J., Meschede, M., Petersen, S., Thiede, J. (eds) Encyclopedia of Marine Geosciences. Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-6238-1_139
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