limestone

English

Etymology

From lime +‎ stone.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈlaɪmˌstoʊn/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈlaɪmˌstəʊn/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aɪmstəʊn

Noun

limestone (countable and uncountable, plural limestones)

1. An abundant rock of marine and fresh-water sediments; primarily composed of calcite (CaCO₃); it occurs in a variety of forms, both crystalline and amorphous.

   a limestone viaduct

   • 1939 July, “What the Railways are Doing: The New Ebbw Vale Steelworks”, in Railway Magazine, page 68:

     As each blast furnace uses 200 tons of limestone daily, and each limestone kiln 150 tons, a total of 730 tons of limestone has to be carried daily, in addition to limestone chippings, which are sold.

   • 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter I, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:

     The house was a big elaborate limestone affair, evidently new. Winter sunshine sparkled on lace-hung casement, on glass marquise, and the burnished bronze foliations of grille and door.

Synonyms

• lime
• calcium carbonate

Hyponyms

• (mineralogy): bluestone, burrstone, calp, coquina, coral rag, chalk, malm, marble, travertine, tufa

Derived terms

• hydraulic limestone
• Limestone Coast
• Limestone County
• limestone hawksbeard
• limestone pavement
• limestone salamander
• lithographic limestone
• magnesian limestone
• mountain limestone
• scar limestone

 

Translations

abundant rock of marine and fresh-water sediments

• Albanian: gur gëlqeror m
• Arabic: حَجَر جِيرِيّ m (ḥajar jīriyy), حَجَر كِلْسِيّ m (ḥajar kilsiyy)
• Armenian: կրաքար (hy) (krakʻar)
• Azerbaijani: əhəngdaşı (az)
• Basque: kareharri inan
• Belarusian: вапня́к m (vapnják)
• Bengali: ঘুটিং (bn) (ghuṭiṅ)
• Bulgarian: варо́вик (bg) (varóvik)
• Burmese: ထုံးကျောက် (my) (htum:kyauk)
• Catalan: pedra calcària
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 石灰岩 (zh) (shíhuīyán), 灰岩 (huīyán), 青石 (zh) (qīngshí) (colloquial)

• Classical Nahuatl: tenextetl
• Czech: vápenec (cs) m
• Danish: kalksten (da) c
• Dutch: kalksteen (nl) n
• Esperanto: kalkoŝtono (eo)
• Estonian: lubjakivi
• Finnish: kalkkikivi (fi), kalkki (fi)
• French: calcaire (fr) m
• Galician: calcaria (gl) f
• Georgian: კირქვა (ḳirkva)
• German: Kalkstein (de) m, Calciumcarbonat (de) n, Kalk (de) m
• Greek: ασβεστόλιθος (el) m (asvestólithos)
• Hebrew: גִּיר (he) m (gir), אֶבֶן גִּיר f (even gir)
• Hindi: चूना पत्थर m (cūnā patthar)
• Hungarian: mészkő (hu)
• Icelandic: kalksteinn (is)
• Indonesian: batu kapur (id)
• Ingrian: kalkki, kalkkikivi
• Irish: aolchloch f, cloch aoil f
• Italian: calcare (it) m
• Japanese: 石灰岩 (ja) (せっかいがん, sekkaigan)
• Kazakh: әктас (kk) (äktas)
• Khmer: ថ្មកំបោរ (thmɑɑ kɑmbao), កំបោរថ្ម (kɑmbao thmɑɑ)
• Korean: 석회암(石灰岩) (ko) (seokhoeam)
• Kyrgyz: акиташ (ky) (akitaş)
• Lao: ຫິນປູນ (hin pūn)
• Latin: calx f
• Latvian: kaļķakmens m
• Lithuanian: klintis m
• Macedonian: варовник m (varovnik)
• Malay: batu kapur
• Maori: pākeho
• Mongolian:

  Cyrillic: шохойн чулуу (šoxojn čuluu)

• Norman: pièrre dé caux f (Jersey)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: kalkstein m

  Nynorsk: kalkstein m

• Occitan: calcari (oc) m, calquièr m
• Persian: سنگ آهک (sang âhak)
• Pitjantjatjara: arpata
• Plautdietsch: Kaulkjsteen n
• Polish: wapień (pl) m
• Portuguese: calcário (pt) m
• Romanian: calcar (ro) n
• Russian: известня́к (ru) m (izvestnják)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: кре̏чња̄к m, вапне́нац m

  Roman: krȅčnjāk (sh) m, vapnénac (sh) m

• Slovak: vápenec (sk) m
• Slovene: apnenec (sl) m
• Spanish: caliza (es) f
• Swedish: kalksten (sv) c
• Tajik: оҳаксанг (ohaksang)
• Tatar: известьташ (izwest’taş)
• Thai: หินปูน (th) (hǐn-bpuun)
• Tibetan: རྡོ་ཐལ་རྡོ (rdo thal rdo), རྡོ་ཐལ་བྲག (rdo thal brag)
• Turkish: kireç taşı (tr)
• Turkmen: hek daşy
• Ukrainian: вапня́к (uk) m (vapnják)
• Urdu: چونا پتھر m (cūnā patthar)
• Uyghur: ھاك تېشى (hak tëshi)
• Uzbek: ohaktosh (uz)
• Vietnamese: đá vôi (vi)
• Welsh: calchfaen (cy) m, carreg galch f

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

• Bulgarian: варо́вик (bg) m (varóvik)
• Dutch: kalkstenen (nl)
• Finnish: kalkkikivinen, kalkkikivi- (fi)
• Galician: calcario (gl) m, calcaria (gl) f
• German: Kalk- (de)
• Polish: wapienny (pl)
• Portuguese: calcário (pt) m, calcária f
• Spanish: calizo (es) m, caliza (es) f
• Tagalog: batong-apog
• Tibetan: རྡོ་ཐལ་གྱི (rdo thal gyi), རྡོ་ཐལ་རྡོའི (rdo thal rdo'i)
• Welsh: calch (cy), calchfaen (cy)

See also

• karst

Anagrams

• lemoniest, milestone