Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of or relating to rocks consisting of cemented fragments that originate from the mechanical breakdown of rocks associated with plate tectonic processes.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Of, pertaining to, or resulting from, a cataclasm.
  • In petrography, noting a structure produced in rocks by crushing or shearing, whereby the minerals are broken into fragments.
  • noun A fragmental texture in a rock or mineral produced by crushing instead of sedimentation.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective geology describing a type of metamorphic rock that has undergone shearing and granulation by high mechanical stress

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[From Norwegian kataklas- (in kataklasstruktur, structure formed by crushing : Greek kata-, cata- + Greek klastos, broken; see clast + Norwegian struktur, structure) + –ic.]

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Examples

  • The tilted rock strata are comprised of largely carbonate Palaeozoic deposits over 4,000 m thick, Mesozoic deposits at least 1,000 m thick with a variety of sedimentary rocks in a cataclastic sedimentation; and recent Cenozoic deposits of glacial moraines, alluvial gravels and carbonate sediments.

    Huanglong National Scenic Area, China 2009

  • The holes were largely targeted at mineralisation hosted in deep lateritic clays present along a tectonic structure, although several holes also intersected mineralisation in the underlying alkaline and strongly cataclastic granite bedrock.

    Marketwire - Breaking News Releases 2009

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