terrace
[ter-uh s]
- a raised level with a vertical or sloping front or sides faced with masonry, turf, or the like, especially one of a series of levels rising one above another.
- the top of such a construction, used as a platform, garden, road, etc.
- a nearly level strip of land with a more or less abrupt descent along the margin of the sea, a lake, or a river.
- the flat roof of a house.
- an open, often paved area connected to a house or an apartment house and serving as an outdoor living area; deck.
- an open platform, as projecting from the outside wall of an apartment; a large balcony.
- a row of houses on or near the top of a slope.
- a residential street following the top of a slope.
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- to form into or furnish with a terrace or terraces.
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Origin of terrace
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for terraced
Contemporary Examples
At the center of allegations about a political cover-up is a nondescript Edwardian terraced house in West London.
They showed my mother, laughing on a terraced hill, land stitched with olive trees.
“Requiem for the Croppies” Terraced thousands died, shaking scythes at cannon.
Historical Examples
"Tell me about yourself," she commanded, when we were beyond the flights of terraced steps.
The Bacillus of BeautyHarriet Stark
The fort, with four bastions, terraced and palisaded, has a garrison.
The History of LouisianaLe Page Du Pratz
The amphitheatre of hills is terraced with olive-orchards and vineyards.
Out-of-Doors in the Holy LandHenry Van Dyke
The parapets of our terraced roofs were higher than my head.
My ReminiscencesRabindranath Tagore
The crown of all this terraced glory is the great cathedral.
From a Terrace in PragueLieut.-Col. B. Granville Baker
terrace
- a horizontal flat area of ground, often one of a series in a slope
- a row of houses, usually identical and having common dividing walls, or the street onto which they face
- (cap when part of a street name)Grosvenor Terrace
- a paved area alongside a building, serving partly as a garden
- a balcony or patio
- the flat roof of a house built in a Spanish or Oriental style
- a flat area bounded by a short steep slope formed by the down-cutting of a river or by erosion
- (usually plural)
- unroofed tiers around a football pitch on which the spectators stand
- the spectators themselves
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- (tr) to make into or provide with a terrace or terraces
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Word Origin
C16: from Old French terrasse, from Old Provençal terrassa pile of earth, from terra earth, from Latin
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for terraced
terrace
n.
1510s, "gallery, portico, balcony," later "flat, raised place for walking" (1570s), from Middle French terrace, from Old French terrasse "platform (built on or supported by a mound of earth)," from Vulgar Latin *terracea, fem. of *terraceus "earthen, earthy," from Latin terra "earth, land" (see terrain). As a natural formation in geology, attested from 1670s.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
terrace
(tĕr′ĭs)- To suture in several rows, as when closing a wound through a considerable thickness of tissue.
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The American Heritage® Stedman's Medical Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company.