Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Any of various medium-grained to coarse-grained metamorphic rocks composed of laminated, often flaky parallel layers of chiefly micaceous minerals.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A rock the constituent minerals of which have assumed a position in more or less closely parallel layers or folia, due not to deposition as a sediment, but—in large part, at least—to metamorphic action, which has caused a rearrangement or imperfect crystallization of the component minerals, or the formation of new ones, these. in the course of the process, having assumed the parallel arrangement characteristic of the rock.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Geol.) Any crystalline rock having a foliated structure (see
foliation ) and hence admitting of ready division into slabs or slates. The common kinds aremica schist , andhornblendic schist , consisting chiefly of quartz with mica or hornblende and often feldspar.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Any
crystalline rock having afoliated structure and hence admitting of ready division intoslabs orslates .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun any metamorphic rock that can be split into thin layers
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Through the years, the wineries have carved amazing steep terraces for grape growing along the banks of the Douro, and there is a unique soil called schist.
Mary Orlin: 10 Things You Don't Know About Portuguese Wine Mary Orlin 2011
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It is here, on top of a thin layer of flaky ocher-colored rock, known as schist, that the vine is at its most unexpected.
A Nation Passing On the Port William Lyons 2011
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Through the years, the wineries have carved amazing steep terraces for grape growing along the banks of the Douro, and there is a unique soil called schist.
Mary Orlin: 10 Things You Don't Know About Portuguese Wine Mary Orlin 2011
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The flake mica produced in the U.S. comes from several sources: the metamorphic rock called schist as a by-product of processing feldspar and kaolin resources, from placer deposits, and from pegmatites.
Mica 2008
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A person floating along the Colorado River can see, at river level, a distinctive rock type called schist.
The Source John Clayton Nils Jansma 2001
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A person floating along the Colorado River can see, at river level, a distinctive rock type called schist.
The Source John Clayton Nils Jansma 2001
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The gold-bearing rock is a heavy ledge of brown, ferruginous mica-schist, which is impregnated with iron pyrites in a state of minute subdivision, and abounds in garnets.
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Hand-trenching tied at least some of these float samples into un-deformed quartz veins within the weathered bedrock schist, which is covered in the area by 0.5 to 12.55 m of overburden.
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We can also ignore metamorphic rocks, such as schist and marble, for they have undergone either superheating or extreme pressure since their initial formation.
NPR Topics: News 2009
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Mount Athos, literally "holy mountain," is a 36-mile finger of granite and schist culminating in a 6,670-foot peak of white crystalline limestone that is visible 100 miles away.
A Fossil With Flesh Nicholas Shakespeare 2011
hernesheir commented on the word schist
(n): a medium grade of metamorphic rock characterized by a preponderance of lamellar minerals such as micas, chlorite, talc, horneblende, graphite, and others.
By definition, shist contains more than 50% lamellar, platy, or elongated minerals, commonly interleaved with quartz and feldspar crystals. Garnet is a common mineral crystal present in schistose rocks.
January 2, 2009