Nashville Basin
Encyclopedia
Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat of Davidson County. It is located on the Cumberland River in Davidson County, in the north-central part of the state. The city is a center for the health care, publishing, banking and transportation industries, and is home...
, Tennessee
Tennessee
Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...
. The Central Basin was caused by an uplifting known as the Nashville Dome. The Nashville Dome is evidenced by the underlying rock strata
Stratum
In geology and related fields, a stratum is a layer of sedimentary rock or soil with internally consistent characteristics that distinguish it from other layers...
that all dip downwards away from Nashville. The uplifting of the Nashville Dome fractured overlying strata, making it more easily eroded and thus the "dome" resulted in a "basin". Uplifted strata in the center of a geological dome have higher potential erosive energy than the surrounding strata, because they are physically higher. Erosion thus acts on the uplifted area at a greater rate than on the surrounding flat-lying area, creating a low area, i.e. a basin. This area is more correctly referred to as the "Central Basin" of Tennessee.
It is apparently uphill in any direction out of Nashville, as a visit to any of the taller buildings in the downtown area will readily make apparent. Nashville itself is located in the northwestern portion of this basin. Traveling north or west out of Nashville one will soon begin the climb up the escarpment
Escarpment
An escarpment is a steep slope or long cliff that occurs from erosion or faulting and separates two relatively level areas of differing elevations.-Description and variants:...
that marks the bordering geographic
Geography
Geography is the science that studies the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. A literal translation would be "to describe or write about the Earth". The first person to use the word "geography" was Eratosthenes...
/geologic province
Geologic province
A geologic or geomorphic province is a spatial entity with common geologic or geomorphic attributes. A province may include a single dominant structural element such as a basin or a fold belt, or a number of contiguous related elements...
, the Highland Rim
Highland Rim
The Highland Rim is a geographic term for the area in Tennessee surrounding the Central Basin. Nashville is largely surrounded by higher terrain in all directions....
. The basin extends for approximately forty-five to sixty miles to the east of Nashville, and about eighty miles to the south, near the Tennessee–Alabama
Alabama
Alabama is a state located in the southeastern region of the United States. It is bordered by Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama ranks 30th in total land area and ranks second in the size of its inland...
state line.
The Central Basin is underlain primarily by limestone
Limestone
Limestone is a sedimentary rock composed largely of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate . Many limestones are composed from skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral or foraminifera....
from the Ordovician
Ordovician
The Ordovician is a geologic period and system, the second of six of the Paleozoic Era, and covers the time between 488.3±1.7 to 443.7±1.5 million years ago . It follows the Cambrian Period and is followed by the Silurian Period...
Period. This area and a similar, but smaller area surrounding Lexington
Lexington, Kentucky
Lexington is the second-largest city in Kentucky and the 63rd largest in the US. Known as the "Thoroughbred City" and the "Horse Capital of the World", it is located in the heart of Kentucky's Bluegrass region...
, Kentucky
Kentucky
The Commonwealth of Kentucky is a state located in the East Central United States of America. As classified by the United States Census Bureau, Kentucky is a Southern state, more specifically in the East South Central region. Kentucky is one of four U.S. states constituted as a commonwealth...
referred to as the "Kentucky Bluegrass
Bluegrass region
The Bluegrass Region is a geographic region in the state of Kentucky, United States. It occupies the northern part of the state and since European settlement has contained a majority of the state's population and its largest cities....
" area, are the two primary areas of this sort in the world.
The Inner Basin of the flattest terrain and most limestone-derived soil chemistry
Soil chemistry
Soil chemistry is the study of the chemical characteristics of soil. Soil chemistry is affected by mineral composition, organic matter and environmental factors.-History:...
is located to the south and east of Nashville, primarily in the counties of Maury, Rutherford, Coffee, and Bedford. Here also are seen the horse farms somewhat reminiscent of the Kentucky Bluegrass region. Supposedly the underlying rock weathers to a soil particularly suited to the growing of the sorts of grasses most favored by horses. Limestone glades (or cedar glades), located to the east of Nashville, primarily in Wilson and Rutherford Counties, are open areas where the flat limestone rock is denuded of overlying soil or nearly so, provide an environment for flora unlike any other in the world.