Piedmont (United States)

The Piedmont refers to a plateau -like region in the eastern United States, extending between the Atlantic Coastal Plain and the central part of the mountain chain of the Appalachians. In the north - south extension extends the eastern slopes of the Appalachian Mountains formed from the plateau of the State of New Jersey as far as Alabama.

The Piedmont region is part of the natural area of the Appalachian Mountains, and consists of the Highlands, the Piedmont highlands and the lowlands, the Piedmont Lowlands. The Fall Line, at the first waterfalls in rivers occur to overcome the differences in height, denotes the transition between the eastern Coastal Plain and the Piedmont. To the west, the Piedmont is mostly limited by the Blue Ridge Mountains. The width of the plateau varied, it starts very narrow above the Delaware River, but achieved in North Carolina has a width of 475 kilometers. The total area of the Piedmont Plateau covers about 207,000 square kilometers

The name " Piedmont " is French and refers to the geography of a foothill zone ( pied = foot, mont = mountain ). Most prominently, this Romanesque root word appears in the name of the Italian region of Piedmont (Italian: Piemonte: roughly at the foot of the mountain ).

Geology

The surface of the Piedmont is characterized by rolling hills, the height above sea level is between 50 meters and 250 meters to 300 meters. The geology is complex with many different rock formations from different materials that mix with others from different age groups. Essentially, the Piedmont, the remnant of different very old mountain ranges that have been eroded over millions of years. Geologists have identified at least five different events of Earth's history that have led to the displacement of the sediment layers, including the Grenville orogeny, in which also the Rodinia was born, and during the formation of Pangaea Appalachenorogenese. The last big event was the break-up of Pangaea, when the American and the African continent began to drift apart. Large sedimentary basins formed by the division and filled gradually by the votes cast by the surrounding higher land masses sediments, strung together Mesozoic sedimentary basins are almost exclusively located in the Piedmont.

Soils

The soils of the Piedmont are generally loamy and moderately fertile. In some areas the soils have suffered greatly from erosion and excessive farming, particularly in the south, especially the cotton was grown. In the central region of Piedmont, in North Carolina and Virginia tobacco is the most important crop, while the soils in the north are used more diverse, for example, for fruit growing, dairy farming and general agriculture

Music

The Piedmont is very strongly associated with the Piedmont blues, a blues style, which is native to the region since the late 19th century. Most of the musicians come from Virginia, the Carolinas and Georgia. During the great wave of migration of African-American residents in the north of the Piedmont blues was influenced by many other styles of music, for example, by ragtime or country music, styles that had little impact on the Blues in other regions.

The Cakewalk or Slow Drag is a characteristic style of dance from the Piedmont, which is based on the local culture of the Piedmont.

Cities

Many larger cities have settled on the Fall Line, the eastern boundary of the plateau. Within the Piedmont itself, there are quite a few highly urbanized areas, such as the Piedmont Crescent, the Piedmonter Crescent in North Carolina has several metropolitan regions, the Metrolina in Charlotte, the Research Triangle to Raleigh -Durham -Chapel Hill and the Piedmont Triad at Greensboro, Winston- Salem and high Point. Another important city on the plateau is Atlanta, Georgia.