Terminology
S
This page provides an alphabetical listing of some of the basic hiking, backpacking, mountaineering, camping, and archaeological terms that one might encounter while preparing for an adventure in canyon country. The definitions on these pages are meant only as a beginning, a point from which to get familiar as quickly as possible with the jargon of the trail. Please do not consider these explanations as definitive nor comprehensive. There are outside resources listed and linked for more in-depth definitions.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
S
Saddle
A low point on a ridge or crest line, generally a divide between the heads of streams flowing in opposite direction.
Salad Plant
Any green plant that may be eaten raw. These plants can also be cooked.
Salado
A prehistoric culture that occupied the Tonto Basin and areas along the Salt River of Arizona from about A.D. 900 to 1400.
Sand
A rock fragment or particle 0.05 to 2 mm in size. The material is most commonly composed of quartz resulting from rock disintegration.
Sand Slide
A steep slope of soft sand.
Sandstone
A sedimentary rock composed of sand-sized particles.
Saponin
A chemical naturally found in many plants. Such plants often produce a good lather when crushed and rubbed in water. Saponin can often be boiled out of a plant, making that plant more edible. Too much saponin ingested can cause diarrhea.
Saprophyte
A plant lacking chlorophyll and living on dead organic matter.
Scarp
An escarpment, cliff, or steep slope of some extent along the margin of a plateau, mesa, terrace, or bench.
Scat
Animal feces.
Scrambling Trail
Routes that are intermediate between steep hiking and technical mountaineering. Scrambling involves using your hands for balance when moving across rock but does not include using your arm strength to pull yourself up, except possibly for single short climbing moves. Scrambles also include routes on hard spring snow where an ice axe is required.
Scree
Loose rock, typically fist size or smaller that accumulates at the base of a rock wall. See Talus.
Sedimentary Rock
A consolidated accumulation of rock and mineral grains and organic matter or a rock that has been formed by chemical or organic precipitation.
Seepline
A line of seepage on a canyon wall, usually supporting the specialized plant community of hanging gardens.
Segment
A subdivision of the body or of an appendage, between membranous regions that permit flexibility.
Sessile
Without a stalk.
Shaft
A mine working, extending from the surface down; can be vertical or inclined. Used to move men and equipment in and out of the mine and to move ore out of the mine.
Shale
A very fine-grained, laminated, clastic sedimentary rock made up of clay-sized particles, none of which are larger than 4 microns. Shale tends to break along parallel planes.
Shaman
A holy leader. May go into trances as part of ceremonials or to receive guidance.
Shamanism
A Native American form of religion dependent on the shaman and his spiritual guidance.
Shard
See Potsherd.
Sherd
See Potsherd.
Shrub
A woody, relatively low plant with several branches from the base.
Side Canyon
A tributary or branch of a larger canyon. In decreasing order of size, local usage is: canyon, fork, gulch.
Silica
Silicon dioxide, a tremendously abundant mineral that occurs widely, and in many forms, including quartz, chalcedony, opal, and chert.
Sill
A tabular, sheet-like body of intrusive igneous rock, which has been injected between layers of sedimentary or metamorphic rock.
Silt
A clastic (made of individual particles) sediment in which most of the particles are between 0.002 and 0.05 mm in diameter.
Siltstone
A sedimentary rock composed of silt-sized particles.
Sinagua
Prehistoric Puebloan tribe that occupied an area in Arizona from Flagstaff down into the Verde Valley area from about A.D. 500 to 1300. They are referred to by many anthropologists as the Western Anasazi.
Singl-wall Tent
A traditional double-wall tent uses an inner canopy (to sleep in) and a rain fly (to keep out the water). A single-wall shelter uses just one layer for both, which makes it extremely light for the space.
Sipapu
The symbolic hole in the center of a kiva, through which spirits pass between this world and the one on the "other side."
Sky Island
Plant and wildlife habitats that are high in the mountains, separated by other mountain habitats by wide, inhospitable valleys. This separation leads to species isolation and, after many thousands of years, the evolution of distinct species characteristics and endemic species.
Slickensides
Striated or highly polished surfaces on hard rocks abraded during movement along a fault.
Slickrock
Generally a smooth, weathered sandstone surface that becomes slippery due to the presence of sand grains. Can be dangerous to walk across.
Slot Canyon
A deep, narrow, steep-walled canyon, most often cut through sandstone, and often with water running along its bottom. Sometimes referred to as narrows. A constriction in a canyon.
Snowfield
An expanse of snow cover that can be either permanent or last well beyond the winter season.
Social
Living in organized communities, with division of labor and castes (at least a worker caste).
Solar Calendars
Images, often circles and spirals, used to determine a specific date, such as a summer or winter solstice.
Solitary
Living alone and independently, not in aggregations or communities.
SP
State Park
Spalling
A natural process of erosion that causes chips or slabs of rock (spalls) to be stripped from the surface. These layers occasionally have rock art images on them.
Species
A fundamental category of taxonomic classification, ranking below a genus.
Spirit Helper
When discussing rock art, a spirit helper is usually a spiritual animal that was the shaman's helper. Many times a depiction of a shaman will have a smaller animal figure (spirit helper) near by.
Split-Grain Leather
In hiking boots, uppers which use the inner (suede) part of the cow hide, splitting it from the supportive, waterproof (smooth) outer part.
SRR
Scenic and Recreational River
Stalactite
Columnar deposits, generally of calcite, formed on the roof of a cavern by the drip of mineral solutions.
Stalagmite
A column or ridge of calcium carbonate rising from the floor of a limestone cave formed by the evaporation of water dripping from above.
Stamp Mill
A historical apparatus in which rock was crushed by descending iron pestles (stamps) generally grouped in units (batteries) of five per mortar. Amalgamation (collection with mercury) was usually combined with stamp milling to recover gold and silver from the crushed rock.
Steamed
To cook food in steam. Wild food is best when steamed in a fire pit, rather than in some other way.
Steep
To extract flavor or medicinal qualities from material by soaking it in hot, but not boiling, water.
Stock
In geology, a large intrusion, but smaller than a batholith, thus less than 40 square miles of surface exposure. Also, range cattle.
Strata
Layers or tabular beds of sedimentary rock that consist of approximately the same kind of material throughout, and that are distinct from the layers above and below.
Stratification
The layered arrangement of sediments, sedimentary rocks, or extrusive igneous rocks.
Stratified
Layered, or sheet-like, rock or earth of one kind lying between beds of other kinds.
Stratovolcano
A volcano with a composite cone, formed by layers of lava and pyroclastics. Most large continental volcanoes are this type. Examples include Mt. Rainier and Mt. St. Helens.
Stream
Any body of flowing water or other fluid, great or small.
Street or Highway
The entire width between boundary lines of every way or place of whatever nature, when any part of it is open to the use of the public for vehicular travel.
Striated
Solid rock that has had parallel grooves cut into its surface by fault movement or by movement of glacial ice.
Structure
Large features of rock masses, such as flow banding and bedding.
Styles
Categories used to describe rock art from different cultures and different periods of time.
Subalpine Zone
The forest or other vegetation immediately below the treeless, barren alpine zone on high mountains.
Subimago
The winged, flying stage of a mayfly, which precedes the final molt to a reproductive adult (imago).
Subsidence
The sudden sinking or gradual downward settling of the Earth's surface with little or no horizontal motion. The movement is not restricted in rate, magnitude, or area involved. Subsidence may be caused by natural geologic processes, such a solution, thawing, compaction, slow crustal warping, or withdrawal of fluid lava from beneath a solid crust; or by Man's activity, such as subsurface mining or the pumping of oil or ground water.
Succulent
Fleshy and thick, storing water; a plant with fleshy, water-storing stems or leaves. All cacti are succulents.
Supspecies
See Race.
SUV
Sports Utility Vehicle.
Swallet
An underground stream, or, an opening through which a stream disappears underground.
Switchback
A sharp turn, typically constructed on trails climbing steep slopes, to allow ascending in a series of more gradual segments.
Syncline
A V-shaped fold with the youngest rock strata at the center.
