barchan
Syllables: bar·chan/ˈbɑːk(ə)n//ˈbɑɹˌkɑn/
barchan noun: an arc-shaped shifting sand dune comprising well-sorted (uniformly sized) sand.
Noun
barchan (plural barchans)
- An arc-shaped shifting sand dune comprising well-sorted (uniformly sized) sand.
- The sand is usually very well sorted in barchans, for it is constantly re-worked as the dune 'marches'. The marching also causes cross-bedding inside the barchan, with a dip parallel to the sand-fall face.1966, E[dwin] S[herbon] Hills, C[liff] D. Ollier, C[harles] R[owland] Twidale, “Geomorphology”, in E. S. Hills, editor, Arid Lands: A Geographical Appraisal (Routledge Revivals), New York, N.Y....
- But to follow the dunes around the foot of their slopes is also tedious and one can walk for half a kilometre east or west, finding one barchan linked to another and no easy way through, and the unverifiable suspicion grows that one has been driven by insensible curves actually southwards.1988, Robert Irwin, chapter 8, in The Mysteries of Algiers, London: Viking, →ISBN, page 69
barchan meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam and Arabic
barchan in Hindi
- arc-shaped shifting sand dune
- बरखान barkhān
barchan in Tamil
- arc-shaped shifting sand dune
- பர்கான் parkāṉ
barchan in Malayalam
- arc-shaped shifting sand dune
- ബർഖൻ baṟkhaṉ
barchan in Arabic
- arc-shaped shifting sand dune
- كَثِيب kaṯīb, كَثِيب هِلَالِيّ kaṯīb hilāliyy
More languagesFewer languages
- barchan in Indonesian
- barchan
- barchan in Persian
- برخان barxân
- barchan in Thai
- เนินทรายรูปพระจันทร์เสี้ยว
Examples of barchan in a sentence
- Barchans and transverse dunes are essentially of the same type, forming and migrating under a unidirectional wind regime.2008, Julie Laity, “Aeolian Processes”, in Deserts and Desert Environments, Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, →ISBN, page 205...
- Perhaps the most distinctive is the barchan dune, an isolated crescentic form with arms that stretch downwind.2010, Robert S[tewart] Anderson, Suzanne P[restrud] Anderson, “Eolian Forms and Deposits”, in Geomorphology: The Mechanics and Chemistry of...
Forms of barchan
| plural | barchans |
|---|---|
| alternative form | barchane |
| alternative form | barkan |
| alternative form | barkhan |
Origin of barchan
Unadapted borrowing from Russian барха́н (barxán), from a Turkic language such as Kazakh барқан (barqan); further etymology unknown. The Russian word was first used in scientific literature in 1881 by the Russian zoologist and explorer Alexander von Middendorf (1815–1894).
Words formed from barchan
- barchanoid
- megabarchan
Questions about barchan
- What does barchan mean?
- Barchan means an arc-shaped shifting sand dune comprising well-sorted (uniformly sized) sand.
- What is barchan in Hindi?
- Barchan in Hindi is बरखान (barkhān). See Barchan meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use barchan in a sentence?
- Barchans and transverse dunes are essentially of the same type, forming and migrating under a unidirectional wind regime.
- What part of speech is barchan?
- Barchan is a noun.
- How do you pronounce barchan?
- Barchan is pronounced /ˈbɑːk(ə)n/ (UK).
- What is the plural of barchan?
- The plural of barchan is barchans.
Words near barchan in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: barchan (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-barchan.wav, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-barchan.wav.
Cite this entry: “barchan.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/barchan. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.