Word Finder - embankment

definition

A long mound of earth, stone, or similar material, usually built for purposes such as to hold back or store water, for protection from weather or enemies, or to support a road or railway.

She finally reached the bottom of the embankment and fell headlong into a bunch of blackberry bushes.

The entrance is protected by forts, while a submarine embankment, 2 m.

Bordeaux led his horse down the embankment and Cassie hesitantly followed.

A great change in the river's course occurred in 1851, when a breach was made in the north embankment near Kaifengfu in Honan.

In consequence of the disastrous flood of 1882, important embankment works were executed along the Adige at a cost of £300,000.

So fierce was the antagonism that the military authorities refused to permit operations of survey in the southern suburb of Tokyo, and the road had to be laid on an embankment constructed in the sea.

An embankment planted with trees fronts the river.

The sumach (Rhus glabra) grew luxuriantly about the house, pushing up through the embankment which I had made, and growing five or six feet the first season.

Not less remarkable was the palace of Tezcuco, surrounded with its groves and pleasure-gardens; and, though now hardly anything remains of the buildings above ground, the neighbouring hill of Tezcotzinco still has its stone steps and terraces; and the immense embankment carrying the aqueduct-channel of hewn stone which supplied water to basins cut in the solid rock still remains to prove that the chroniclers' descriptions, if highly coloured, were at any rate genuine.

An endeavour is made so to plan the works of a railway that the quantity of earth excavated in cuttings shall be equal to the quantity required for the embankments; but this is not always practicable, and it is sometimes advantageous to obtain the earth from some source close to the embankment rather than incur the expense of hauling it from a distant cutting.

Sometimes also a viaduct consisting of a series of arches is preferred to an embankment when the line has to be taken over a piece of fiat alluvial plain, or when it is desired to economize space and to carry the line at a sufficient height to clear the streets, as in the case of various railways entering London and other large towns.

The beautiful Chelsea embankment, planted with trees and lined with fine houses and, in part, with public gardens, stretches between Victoria and Battersea bridges.

Suddenly the sound of a firing of cannon was heard from the embankment, to celebrate the signing of peace with the Turks, and the crowd rushed impetuously toward the embankment to watch the firing.

Intermediate stations, like terminal ones, should be convenient in situation and easy of approach, and, especially if they are important, should be on the ground level rather than on an embankment or in a cutting.

The statue by Boehm on the Chelsea Embankment, however, is characteristic; and there is a fine painting by Watts in the National Portrait Gallery.

Somerset House (1776-1786), a massive range of buildings by Sir William Chambers, surrounding a quadrangle, and having its front upon the Strand and back upon the Victoria Embankment, occupies the site of a palace founded by the protector Somerset, c. 1548.

A remarkably fine embankment belonging to it still exists at Aricia.

The first police office was located in Whitehall in Scotland Yard, from which it was removed in the autumn of 1890 to the new and imposing edifice on the Embankment, in which all branches are now concentrated, known as New Scotland Yard.

By 1863 a great embankment and a roadway were completed along the river, which may rise as much as 50 ft.

Another important improvement, for which a concession was given to an English syndicate and work was begun in 1909, is the construction of an embankment and new shore line on the south side of the city, to be finished in five years at a cost of $7,211,116.

By means of the embankment made in connexion with it, 400 acres were reclaimed from the sea.

Upon the advent of the Left to power, however, he accepted both gift and pension, and worked energetically upon the scheme for the Tiber embankment to prevent the flooding of Rome.

These rise generally only a few feet above the level of the sea, and are crowned by a single house standing on an artificial mound and protected by a surrounding dike or embankment.

The Greek hippodrome was usually set out on the slope of a hill, and the ground taken from one side served to form the embankment on the other side.

The harbour consisted of the outer basin, or Porto di Miseno, protected by moles, of which remains still exist, and the present Mare Morto, separated from it by a comparatively modern embankment.

An interesting case of embankment and cutting in combination was involved in crossing Chat Moss on the Liverpool & Manchester railway.

The town dates from 1780 and owes its rise to the granite quarries at Craignair and elsewhere in the vicinity, from which were derived the supplies used in the construction of the Thames Embankment, the docks at Odessa and Liverpool and other works.

A statue in bronze was placed on the Thames Embankment, and there is a good portrait by Watts (a copy of which, by Watts himself, was hung in the National Gallery).

The harbours are connected with the town by an embankment and railway built across a shallow, dry at low water save for a narrow channel.

In consequence of the breaking away of the lower part of "Cleopatra's Needles" when removed to Alexandria and re-erected, the Roman engineers supported the angles on bronze crabs, one of which with three reproductions now supports the angles of the obelisk on the Thames Embankment.

The Thames follows a devious course through London, and the fine embankments on its north side, nowhere continuing uninterruptedly for more than 2 m., do not form important thoroughfares, with the exception of the Victoria Embankment.

Its finest portion is the Chelsea Embankment, fronting Battersea Park across the river, shaded by a pleasant avenue and lined with handsome houses.

It was formed in 1864-1870, and is named the Victoria Embankment, though its popular title is " The Embankment " simply.

Below London Bridge the river is embanked for a short distance in front of the Tower of London, and above Westminster Bridge the Albert Embankment extends for nearly 1 m.

Cleopatra's Needle, an ancient Egyptian monument, was presented to the government by Mehemet Ali in 1819, brought from Alexandria in 1878, and erected on the Victoria embankment on a pedestal of grey granite.

The City of London School, founded in Milk Street, Cheapside, by the City Corporation in 1835, occupies modern buildings on the Victoria Embankment.

Music. - The principal educational institutions are - the Royal Academy of Music, Tenterden Street, Hanover Square; the Royal College of Music, South Kensington; Guildhall School, City, near the Victoria Embankment; London College, Great Marlborough Street; Trinity College, Manchester Square; Victoria College, Berners Street; and the Royal College of Organists, Bloomsbury.

The deposit lies partly under the foreshore of the river Duddon, and a company has expended upwards of 120,000 upon a sea-wall and embankment to protect the mine from the sea.

It is first surrounded by an embankment, after which the water from the river is allowed to flow through a properly constructed sluice in its bank, along a drain or ditch to the land which is prepared for warping.

In addition to the Adige embankment, other hydraulic works have been either completed or undertaken.

Native kings protected it from the rivers by a masonry embankment several miles long, built of enormous blocks of hewn stone, and in some places 25 ft.

The policy of opposing uncivilized tribes by the construction of the limes, a raised embankment of earth or other material, intersected here and there by fortifications, was not his invention, but it owed in great measure its development to him.

The Ibrahimia canal is skirted by a magnificent embankment planted with shady trees leading from the river to the town.

Quicker or slower, the water that fills it will wash in sand and mud, and year by year this process will go on till ultimately the whole reservoir is filled up. The embankment is raised, and raised again, but at last it is better to abandon it and make a new tank elsewhere, for it would never pay to dig out the silt by manual labour.

Large sluices of stone, with strong doors, to be shut when it is wished to exclude the tide, may be seen on both banks of the river, and from these great conduits are carried miles inward through the flat country to the point previously prepared by embankment over which the muddy waters are allowed to spread.

To ensure this deposition, it is necessary to surround the field to be warped with a strong embankment, in order to retain the water as the tide recedes.

These sluices are placed on as low a level as possible to permit the most turbid water at the bottom of the tide to pass through a channel in the base of the embankment.

Along each edge of the river and following its course has been erected an earthen embankment high enough not to be topped by the highest floods.

Several thoroughfares also converge upon Vauxhall Bridge, and from a point near this down to Westminster Bridge the river is bordered by the fine Albert Embankment.

Among institutions the principal is St Thomas' Hospital, the extensive buildings of which front the Albert Embankment.