Cordilleras
Cordillera , in the Spanish original Cordillera , describes mountain systems in different parts of the world.
Word origin
Spanish cordillera or pluraliter cordilleras is a diminutive of the Latin corda "rope, rope, leash, string" (cf. German cord ), and corresponds to the German pictorial expression mountain chain or chain mountains . Along with Sierra, it is the most important mountain name in Spanish.
The name is common in those areas where the Spanish language is or was an official language. Some of these terms have been Germanized, others not. One speaks of cordillera (as a collective term for several mountain ranges) or of cordillera as plural tantum .
The most important mountain range with this name is the mountain range that stretches along the west coast of the American double continent . The word is also represented in English as cordillera because the south-east of today's USA was colonized by Spanish, and already had a European name when the western expansion of the land grab in North America reached the mountains. The more northern Rocky Mountains (part of this mountain system) no longer belonged to the Spanish-speaking area and were given an English name.
"Cordillera" as the name of mountain formations
Europe
- Betic cordillera , Cordilleras béticas in southern Spain
- Spanish Central Cordillera , Cordillera Ibérica , Iberian Scheidegebirge
- Cantabrian Cordillera, Cordillera Cantabrica in Spain, see Cantabrian Mountains
- Catalan Coastal Mountains , Cordilleras Costero Catalanas : Cordillera Transversal , Cordillera Prelitoral , Cordillera Litoral
- Moldanubian Cordillera , mountain range south of the Saxothuringian Basin in the Devonian Mountains
North and Central America
- Arctic Cordillera , along the northeast coast of Canada
- American Cordillera from North to South America (see there for the structure)
Within the American Cordilleras, the following mountain ranges are called "Cordilleras" in North and Central America:
- Pacific Cordillera , another name for the Cascade Range in Canada and the United States
- Cordillera Volcánica in Mexico
- Cordillera de Talamanca in Costa Rica
Caribbean
In the Dominican Republic:
South America
- Andes or Andean Cordillera , the South American section of the American Cordillera
The Andes mountain system stretches from Colombia in the north to Chile and Argentina in the south. The Andes are divided into various geographical regions, which roughly correspond to the national territories of the Andean countries, in one to three cordilleras, each running in a north-south direction and therefore named after their western, central or eastern location:
- Western Cordillera, Cordillera Occidental
- Central Cordillera, Cordillera Central
- Eastern Cordillera, Cordillera Oriental
For different sections of the Andes in the individual areas or countries (see below) the same names are sometimes used, but without, for example, denoting a continuous eastern cordillera from Colombia via Ecuador and Peru to Bolivia. There are also names for subsections and connecting mountain ranges between the Cordillera. Where the Andes are not divided, e.g. B. in Chile, the name is simply Cordillera de los Andes .
The following mountain ranges exist in the individual countries:
- Venezuela
- Colombia
- Ecuador
- Cordillera Costanera , coastal mountain range in Ecuador, which does not belong to the Andes
- Cordillera Occidental
- Cordillera Real , also Cordillera Central or Cordillera Oriental
- Peru
- Bolivia
- Cordillera Occidental
- Cordillera Central
-
Cordillera Oriental
- Cordillera de Cochabamba , also Cordillera de la Herradura
- Chile
- Cordillera de los Andes , Andes
- Cordillera de la Costa , coastal mountains
- Cordillera Darwin , on Tierra del Fuego as the southernmost reaches of the Cordilleras
Asia
- Filipino Cordillera , Central Cordillera of the north island of Luzón
- Annamite Cordillera in Vietnam and Laos, and Truong Son called
Oceania
- Australian Cordillera , see Great Dividing Range
Planetology
- Montes Cordillera on the moon
Bibliography
- ^ W. Haas, 1994. The Devonian reefs of the Rhenish Slate Mountains in a global and European context. Geological history in the Rhineland, Munich: Verlag Dr. Friedrich Pfeil: Page 78, Fig.7.6