Dictionary

calcareous en · ADJ

Pronunciation

• /kælˈkɛəɹi.əs/
• (Southern-England) audio

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin calcārius (“of or pertaining to lime”), derived from calx (“lime”). Similar to calcium.

Meanings

1. Resembling, containing, or composed of calcium carbonate or limestone; chalky.
   • Instead, the spoil will be used in part to create 127 hectares of new calcareous grassland (alkaline grassland), woodland, wood pasture, and wetland habitats. 2024 March 20, Chris Howe, “High speed underneath the Chilterns...”, in RAIL, number 1005, page 33:
   • The next morning I went to see the hot-springs and mud volcanoes, for which this place is celebrated. A picturesque path among plantations and ravines brought us to a beautiful circular basin about forty feet in diameter, bordered by a calcareous ledge, so uniform and truly curved, that it looked like a work of art. 1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, volume I, London: Macmillan and Co., page 405:
   • The traveller from the coast, who, after plodding northward for a score of miles over calcareous downs and corn-lands, suddenly reaches the verge of one of these escarpments[.] 1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, volume 1, London: James R. Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., page 15:
   • Cellariiform, the orifices nearly confined to the convex frontal and lateral surfaces; the basal surface with a strong median calcareous keel, almost concealed by a flat membranous epitheca, which covers the whole zoarium […] 1957, Sidney Frederic Harmer, The Polyzoa of the Siboga Expedition, page 1106:
2. Growing in a chalky habitat.

Forms

Deriveds

noncalcareous · subcalcareous · uncalcareous · corneo-calcareous · semicalcareous · calcareously · calcareous sponge · calcareousness

Relateds

calciferous

Translations (12)

fr calcaire (resembling or containing limestone) · nl kalk- (resembling or containing limestone) · nl kalkachtig (resembling or containing limestone) · es calcáreo (resembling or containing limestone) · it calcareo (resembling or containing limestone) · ru известко́вый (resembling or containing limestone) · gl calcario (resembling or containing limestone) · pl wapienny (resembling or containing limestone) · nl kalkhoudend (resembling or containing limestone) · ca calcari (resembling or containing limestone) · ja 石灰質の (resembling or containing limestone) · ja 炭酸カルシウムの (resembling or containing limestone)