stratigraphy

American  

[struh-tig-ruh-fee] / strəˈtɪg rə fi /

noun

1. a branch of geology dealing with the classification, nomenclature, correlation, and interpretation of stratified rocks.

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stratigraphy British  

/ strəˈtɪɡrəfə, strəˈtɪɡrəfɪ, strəˈtɪɡrəfɪst, ˌstrætɪˈɡræfɪk /

noun

1.  stratig.  the study of the composition, relative positions, etc, of rock strata in order to determine their geological history

2. archaeol a vertical section through the earth showing the relative positions of the human artefacts and therefore the chronology of successive levels of occupation

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stratigraphy Scientific  

/ strə-tĭg′rə-fē /

1. The scientific study of rock strata, especially the distribution, deposition, correlation, and age of sedimentary rocks.

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Other Word Forms

• stratigrapher noun
• stratigraphic adjective
• stratigraphical adjective
• stratigraphically adverb
• stratigraphist noun

Etymology

Origin of stratigraphy

First recorded in 1860–65; strati- + -graphy

Example Sentences

The two cores used for this study spanned roughly 500 meters of stratigraphy, or 133 million years, with around 15 million years of significant deposition.

From Science Daily • Jan. 11, 2024

But, says anthropologist John Hawks, a Rising Star team member and co-author of the papers, “The strongest evidence we have is that the burials disrupt the existing stratigraphy in the cave.”

From National Geographic • Jun. 5, 2023

The societies that created these written references are also often societies with a high social stratigraphy.

From Scientific American • May 18, 2023

The dates of the graves, based on stratigraphy and a few scattered objects, closely aligned with the dates of the historically documented battles.

From New York Times • Oct. 4, 2022

By noting which craters overlap which and other signs of lunar stratigraphy, we can reconstruct the sequence of impact and flooding events of which the production of crater Bruno is perhaps the most recent example.

From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan