Glossary
Cave and karst terms used on this site, with short explanations.
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Cave and karst terms
33 terms in plain English.
This glossary explains the terms used on the site, together with a few local words you will meet on maps and signs.
- Chullpa Quechua
- A burial tower or tomb. The cliff tombs at Revash are a form of chullpa.
- Collapse doline
- A steep-sided, often deep hollow formed when the roof of a cave chamber falls in.
- Column
- A dripstone pillar formed when a stalactite and a stalagmite meet.
- Curtain drapery
- A thin, wavy sheet of calcite hanging from an inclined ceiling, often translucent.
- Doline sinkhole
- A closed, bowl- or funnel-shaped depression in karst, typically tens of metres across.
- Dolomite
- A carbonate rock similar to limestone, containing magnesium. Many of the oldest caves are in dolomite.
- Flowstone
- Sheets of calcite laid down by water flowing in a film over walls and floors.
- Guano
- Accumulated droppings of bats or birds. It is the main food source in many caves.
- Guácharo Spanish
- The oilbird, a nocturnal fruit-eating bird that nests in caves.
- Helictite
- A small, twisted speleothem that grows in any direction.
- Huaca Quechua
- A sacred place or object. Carved rock outcrops such as Qenqo were huacas.
- Karren
- Grooves, runnels and sharp ridges dissolved into bare limestone surfaces.
- Karst
- A landscape formed on soluble rock, with underground drainage, caves, sinkholes and few surface streams. The word comes from the Kras plateau in Slovenia.
- Lava tube
- A cave left when the outer surface of a lava flow hardens and the molten rock inside drains away.
- Machay Quechua
- Cave or rock shelter, as in Pikimachay.
- Natural bridge
- A remnant of a cave roof left spanning a valley after the rest has collapsed.
- Phreatic
- Formed below the water table, in completely flooded conditions. Phreatic passages tend to be rounded tubes.
- Polje
- A large, flat-floored closed basin in karst, often flooded seasonally.
- Ponor swallow hole
- A point where surface water disappears underground.
- Purunmachu
- A Chachapoya sarcophagus made of clay and cane, set on a cliff ledge.
- Resurgence
- A spring where an underground stream returns to the surface.
- Rimstone dam gour
- A wall of calcite built up at the edge of a pool by the water flowing over it.
- Show cave
- A cave equipped and managed for visitors, usually with paths, lighting and guided tours.
- Soda straw
- A thin, hollow stalactite with the diameter of a water drop. It is the first stage of most stalactites.
- Speleology
- The scientific study of caves.
- Speleothem
- Any mineral deposit formed in a cave, such as stalactites, stalagmites and flowstone. Commonly called dripstone.
- Speleotherapy
- Treatment of respiratory conditions by spending time in the air of caves or salt mines.
- Stalactite
- A speleothem hanging from the ceiling. Memory aid: c for ceiling.
- Stalagmite
- A speleothem rising from the floor. Memory aid: g for ground.
- Sump siphon
- A section of passage completely filled with water, passable only by diving.
- Troglobite
- An animal that can live only in caves, typically blind and without pigment.
- Tsingy
- A Malagasy word for limestone eroded into fields of sharp pinnacles.
- Vadose
- Formed above the water table, by free-flowing streams. Vadose passages are often tall, narrow canyons.
See the terms in context
The page on how caves form uses most of these words.