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In agriculture
Agriculture

Agriculture refers to the production of food and goods through farming and forestry. Agriculture was the key development that led to the rise of civilization, with the animal husbandry of domestication animals and plants creating food surpluses that enabled the development of more Population density and Social stratification societies....
, a terrace is a leveled section of a hill
Hill

A hill is a landform that extends above the surrounding terrain, in a limited area. Hills often have a distinct Summit , although in areas with Escarpment a hill may refer to a particular section of scarp slope without a well-defined summit ....
y cultivated area, designed as a method of soil conservation
Soil conservation

Soil conservation is a set of management strategies for prevention of soil being erosion from the earth?s surface or becoming chemically altered by overuse, salinization, acidification, or other chemical soil contamination....
 to slow or prevent the rapid surface runoff
Surface runoff

Surface runoff is the water flow which occurs when soil is infiltrated to full capacity and excess water, from rain, snowmelt, or other sources flows over the land....
 of irrigation
Irrigation

Irrigation is an artificial application of water to the soil usually for assisting in growing crops. In crop production it is mainly used in dry areas and in periods of rainfall shortfalls, but also to protect plants against frost....
 water. Often such land is formed into multiple terraces, giving a stepped appearance. The human landscapes of rice
Rice

Rice is a staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in tropical Latin America, and East Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia, making it the second-most consumed cereal grain, after maize....
 cultivation in terraces that follow the natural contours of the escarpments like contour plowing
Contour plowing

Contour plowing or contour farming is the farming practice of plowing across a slope following its elevation contour lines. The rows formed have the effect of slowing water run-off during rainstorms so that the soil is not washed away and allows the water to percolate into the soil....
 is a classic feature of the island of Bali
Bali

Bali is an Indonesian island located at , the westernmost of the Lesser Sunda Islands, lying between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. It is one of the country's 33 Provinces of Indonesia with the provincial capital at Denpasar towards the south of the island....
 and the Banaue Rice Terraces
Banaue Rice Terraces

The Banaue Rice Terraces are 2000-year old Terrace s that were carved into the mountains of Ifugao in the Philippines by ancestors of the Batad indigenous people....
 in Benguet
Benguet

Benguet is a landlocked Provinces of the Philippines of the Philippines in the Cordillera Administrative Region in Luzon. Its capital is La Trinidad, Benguet and borders, clockwise from the south, Pangasinan, La Union province, Ilocos Sur, Mountain Province, Ifugao, and Nueva Vizcaya....
, Philippines
Philippines

The Philippines, officially known as the Republic of the Philippines, is a country in Southeast Asia with Manila as its capital city. It comprises 7,107 islands in the western Pacific Ocean....
.






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In agriculture
Agriculture

Agriculture refers to the production of food and goods through farming and forestry. Agriculture was the key development that led to the rise of civilization, with the animal husbandry of domestication animals and plants creating food surpluses that enabled the development of more Population density and Social stratification societies....
, a terrace is a leveled section of a hill
Hill

A hill is a landform that extends above the surrounding terrain, in a limited area. Hills often have a distinct Summit , although in areas with Escarpment a hill may refer to a particular section of scarp slope without a well-defined summit ....
y cultivated area, designed as a method of soil conservation
Soil conservation

Soil conservation is a set of management strategies for prevention of soil being erosion from the earth?s surface or becoming chemically altered by overuse, salinization, acidification, or other chemical soil contamination....
 to slow or prevent the rapid surface runoff
Surface runoff

Surface runoff is the water flow which occurs when soil is infiltrated to full capacity and excess water, from rain, snowmelt, or other sources flows over the land....
 of irrigation
Irrigation

Irrigation is an artificial application of water to the soil usually for assisting in growing crops. In crop production it is mainly used in dry areas and in periods of rainfall shortfalls, but also to protect plants against frost....
 water. Often such land is formed into multiple terraces, giving a stepped appearance. The human landscapes of rice
Rice

Rice is a staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in tropical Latin America, and East Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia, making it the second-most consumed cereal grain, after maize....
 cultivation in terraces that follow the natural contours of the escarpments like contour plowing
Contour plowing

Contour plowing or contour farming is the farming practice of plowing across a slope following its elevation contour lines. The rows formed have the effect of slowing water run-off during rainstorms so that the soil is not washed away and allows the water to percolate into the soil....
 is a classic feature of the island of Bali
Bali

Bali is an Indonesian island located at , the westernmost of the Lesser Sunda Islands, lying between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. It is one of the country's 33 Provinces of Indonesia with the provincial capital at Denpasar towards the south of the island....
 and the Banaue Rice Terraces
Banaue Rice Terraces

The Banaue Rice Terraces are 2000-year old Terrace s that were carved into the mountains of Ifugao in the Philippines by ancestors of the Batad indigenous people....
 in Benguet
Benguet

Benguet is a landlocked Provinces of the Philippines of the Philippines in the Cordillera Administrative Region in Luzon. Its capital is La Trinidad, Benguet and borders, clockwise from the south, Pangasinan, La Union province, Ilocos Sur, Mountain Province, Ifugao, and Nueva Vizcaya....
, Philippines
Philippines

The Philippines, officially known as the Republic of the Philippines, is a country in Southeast Asia with Manila as its capital city. It comprises 7,107 islands in the western Pacific Ocean....
. In Peru
Peru

Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....
, the Inca made use of otherwise unusable slopes by drystone walling to create terraces. This form of land use is prevalent in many countries, and is used for crops requiring a lot of water, such as rice. Terraces are also easier for both mechanical and manual sowing and harvesting than a steep slope would be.

Natural terracing, the result of small-scale erosion, is formed where cattle are grazed for long periods on steep sloping pasture. Sometimes, for example at Glastonbury Tor
Glastonbury Tor

Glastonbury Tor is a hill at Glastonbury, Somerset, England, which features the roofless St. Michael's Tower. The site is managed by the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty....
, the result is regular enough to give an impression of archaeological artifact
Artifact (archaeology)

In archaeology, an artifact or artefact is any object made or modified by a human archaeological culture, and often one later recovered by some archaeological endeavor....
s.

From its origins in agriculture the practice of formally terracing
Terrace (gardening)

In gardening, a terrace is an element where a raised flat paved or gravelled section overlooks a prospect. A raised terrace keeps a house dry and provides a transition between the hard materials of the architecture and softer ones of the garden....
 a sloping site evolved in gardening. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon
Hanging Gardens of Babylon

The Hanging Gardens of Babylon, also known as the Hanging Gardens of Semiramis, near present-day Al Hillah in Iraq , is considered one of the original Seven Wonders of the Ancient World....
 could have been built on an artificial mountain with stepped terraces like those on a ziggurat
Ziggurat

A ziggurat was a temple tower of the ancient Mesopotamian valley and Iran, having the form of a terraced pyramid of successively receding stories or levels....
. At the seaside Villa of the Papyri
Villa of the Papyri

The Villa of the Papyri is a private house in the ancient Roman city of Herculaneum . Situated north-west of the township, the residence sits halfway up the slope of the volcano Vesuvius without other buildings to obstruct the view....
 in Herculaneum
Herculaneum

Herculaneum is an ancient Roman Empire town, located in the territory of the current commune of Ercolano. Its ruins can be found at the co-ordinates , in the Italy region of Campania....
, the villa gardens of Julius Caesar's father-in-law fell away giving pleasant and varied views of the Bay of Naples.

Terraces were also methods of soil conservation farming for the Inca. They used a system of canal
Canal

Canals are artificial channels for water. There are two types of canals: Aqueduct canals, which are used for the conveyance and delivery of water, and waterways, which are navigable transportation canals used for passage of goods and people, often connected to existing lakes, rivers, or oceans....
s and aqueduct
Aqueduct

File:Tomar December 2008-4.jpgAn aqueduct is a water supply or navigable canal constructed to convey water. In modern engineering, the term is used for any system of pipes, ditches, canals, tunnels, and other structures used for this purpose....
s, and made the water flow through dry land and helped them be fertile lands.

The Incas constructed the terraces on the slopes of the Andes mountains. They cut step-like ledges into the mountainside, so they could be used as field, where they planted crops. Using terraces also stopped the rain from washing away the soil. This technique was so successful, it is still used in the Andes Mountains.

In old English
English language

English is a West Germanic language that originated in Anglo-Saxon England and has lingua franca status in many parts of the world as a result of the military, economic, scientific, political and cultural influence of the British Empire in the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries and that of the United States from the mid 20th century onwa...
, a terrace was also called a lynch
Lynch

Lynch may refer to:*Lynching, also known as Lynch law; named after Charles Lynch ; a form of extralegal judgment and punishment, usually by killing...
 and there is a fine example of a Lynch Mill in Lyme Regis
Lyme Regis

Lyme Regis is a coastal town in West Dorset, England, situated 25 miles west of Dorchester, Dorset and east of Exeter. The town lies in Lyme Bay, on the English Channel coast at the Dorset-Devon border....
, for which the water arrives via a river ducted along a terrace. This set-up was used in steeply hilly areas in the UK.

Gallery

Image:Terrace field yunnan china.jpg>Abstract pattern of terrace rice fields in Yuanyang, Yunnan
Yunnan

is a political divisions of China of the People's Republic of China, located in the far southwest of the country spanning approximately 394,000 square kilometers ....
 Province, southern China
China

China is a Culture of China, an ancient civilization, and, depending on perspective, a national or multinational entity extending over a large area in East Asia....
 Image:Landscape in Sa Pa (Vietnam).jpg|Terraced fields in Sa Pa
Sa Pa

Sa Pa or Sapa is a frontier town and district in the Lao Cai Province in northwest Vietnam. It is one of the main market towns in the area, where many ethnic minority groups such as H'mong, Dao and Tay live....
, Vietnam
Vietnam

Vietnam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam , is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by People's Republic of China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea to the east....
 Image:Terrace_in_Istanbul.JPG?|Istanbul
Istanbul

Istanbul is the largest city in Turkey, List of metropolitan areas in Europe by population, and List of cities proper by population in the world with a population of 12.6 million....
, Turkey
Turkey

Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country that stretches across the Anatolian peninsula in southwest Asia and Thrace in the Balkans region of Southern Europe....
: In many places along the wall of Constantinople
Constantinople

Constantinople was the empire capital of the Roman Empire , the Byzantine Empire , the Latin Empire , and the Ottoman Empire . Strategically located between the Golden Horn and the Sea of Marmara at the point where Europe meets Asia, Byzantine Constantinople had been the capital of a Christendom empire, successor to ancient ancient Greece...
, terrace agriculture is still used for raising different crops Image:Peru_terrace_farming.JPG|Terraced potato
Potato

The potato is a starchy, tuberous crop from the perennial plant Solanum tuberosum of the Solanaceae family. The word potato may refer to the plant itself as well....
 fields near Arequipa
Arequipa

Arequipa is the capital of the Arequipa Region in southern Peru. With a population of 1,000,291 it is the List of 20 largest cities in Peru of the country....
, Peru
Peru

Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....
 Image:Bangali, a village in Uttaranchal near Nandprayag.jpg|Terrace fields at Bangali, a village in near Nandaprayag, India
India

India, officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and outlying territories by total area country by geographical area, the List of countries by population country, and the most populous liberal democracy in the world....
 Image:Rice terraces.png|Banaue Rice Terraces
Banaue Rice Terraces

The Banaue Rice Terraces are 2000-year old Terrace s that were carved into the mountains of Ifugao in the Philippines by ancestors of the Batad indigenous people....
, Ifugao Province, Philippines


See also

  • Anden
    Anden

    Andenes are Terrace s dug into the slopes of mountains for agricultural purposes. They were constructed and much used in the mountain range of the Andes, to produce cultivable hillsides....


External links