A dale is a

valley A valley is an elongated low area often running between hills or mountains and typically containing a river or stream running from one end to the other. Most valleys are formed by erosion of the land surface by rivers or streams over ...

, especially an open, gently-sloping ground between low

hill A hill is a landform that extends above the surrounding terrain. It often has a distinct summit, and is usually applied to peaks which are above elevation compared to the relative landmass, though not as prominent as Mountain, mountains. Hills ...

s with a

stream A stream is a continuous body of water, body of surface water Current (stream), flowing within the stream bed, bed and bank (geography), banks of a channel (geography), channel. Depending on its location or certain characteristics, a strea ...

flowing through it. It is used most frequently in the North of England and the

Southern Uplands The Southern Uplands () are the southernmost and least populous of mainland Scotland's three major geographic areas (the others being the Central Lowlands and the Highlands). The term is used both to describe the geographical region and to col ...

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

; the term "

fell A fell (from Old Norse ''fell'', ''fjall'', "mountain"Falk and Torp (2006:161).) is a high and barren landscape feature, such as a mountain or Moorland, moor-covered hill. The term is most often employed in Fennoscandia, Iceland, the Isle of M ...

" commonly refers to

mountain A mountain is an elevated portion of the Earth's crust, generally with steep sides that show significant exposed bedrock. Although definitions vary, a mountain may differ from a plateau in having a limited summit area, and is usually higher t ...

s or

s that flank a dale. As with many other words, ''dale'' was preserved by Viking influence in Northern England. It appears in various contexts, such as up hill and down dale "over every hill and dale", and "up all hills, down all dales.

Etymology

The word ''dale'' comes from the

Old English Old English ( or , or ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...

word ''dæl'', from which the word "

dell Dell Inc. is an American technology company that develops, sells, repairs, and supports personal computers (PCs), Server (computing), servers, data storage devices, network switches, software, computer peripherals including printers and webcam ...

" also derived. It is related to

Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...

word ''dalr'' (and the modern Icelandic word ''dalur'', etc.), which may have influenced its survival in northern England. The Germanic origin is assumed to be *''dala-''. ''Dal-'' in various combinations is common in placenames in Norway. Modern English valley and French vallée are claimed to be related to dale. A distant relative of ''dale'' is currency unit

dollar Dollar is the name of more than 25 currencies. The United States dollar, named after the international currency known as the Spanish dollar, was established in 1792 and is the first so named that still survives. Others include the Australian d ...

, stemming from German ''thaler'' or ''daler'', short for

joachimsthaler A thaler or taler ( ; , previously spelled ) is one of the large silver coins minted in the states and territories of the Holy Roman Empire and the Habsburg monarchy during the Early Modern period. A ''thaler'' size silver coin has a diameter o ...

coins manufactured in the town of Joachimsthal in

Bohemia Bohemia ( ; ; ) is the westernmost and largest historical region of the Czech Republic. In a narrow, geographic sense, it roughly encompasses the territories of present-day Czechia that fall within the Elbe River's drainage basin, but historic ...

.Falk, Hjalmar (1991). ''Etymologisk ordbog over det norske og det danske sprog.'' Oslo: Bjørn Ringstrøms antikvariat. . The word is perhaps related to Welsh ''dol'' (meadow, pasture, valley), Russian ''dol'' (valley, reverse side) and Serbian/Croatian/Bulgarian/Russian ''dolina'' (basin, '' doline'' is a geological term for certain surface depressions in

karst Karst () is a topography formed from the dissolution of soluble carbonate rocks such as limestone and Dolomite (rock), dolomite. It is characterized by features like poljes above and drainage systems with sinkholes and caves underground. Ther ...

areas). The uses are semantic equivalents to many words and phrases, suggesting a common

Indo-European The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the northern Indian subcontinent, most of Europe, and the Iranian plateau with additional native branches found in regions such as Sri Lanka, the Maldives, parts of Central Asia (e. ...

affinity.

Vale A vale is a type of valley. Vale may also refer to: Places Georgia * Vale, Georgia, a town in the Samtskhe-Javakheti region Norway * Våle, a historic municipality Portugal * Vale (Santa Maria da Feira), a former civil parish in the municip ...

and

thalweg In geography, hydrography, and fluvial geomorphology, a thalweg or talweg () is the line or curve of lowest elevation within a valley or watercourse. Normally only the horizontal position of the curve is considered (as viewed on a map); the c ...

are also related.

Uses

The following are several examples of major dales that have the name dale. The river name is usually appended with "-dale". There are also many smaller dales; this is not an exhaustive list (see

dale (place name element) A dale is a valley. It was commonly used in northern England and Scotland to denote an open valley as a dale, contrasted with a gill or narrow valley. List of places Places where dale is part of the name, but not the entire common name: Unite ...

for more). *

Airedale Airedale is a valley, or Dale (landform), dale, in North Yorkshire and West Yorkshire, England. It is named after the River Aire, which flows through it. The upper valley, from Malham Cove to Airton, is known as Malhamdale, named after the vill ...

(Yorkshire) * Annandale (Scottish Lowlands) *

Coquetdale The River Coquet runs through the county of Northumberland, England, discharging into the North Sea on the east coast at Amble. It rises in the Cheviot Hills on the border between England and Scotland, and follows a winding course across the l ...

(Northumberland) * Ennerdale (Cumberland) * Eskdale (Cumberland) * Eskdale (Scottish Lowlands) * Eskdale (Yorkshire) *

Lauderdale Lauderdale is the valley of the Leader Water (a tributary of the River Tweed, Tweed) in the Scottish Borders. It contains the town of Lauder, as well as Earlston. The valley is traversed from end to end by the A68 road, A68 trunk road, which run ...

(Scottish Lowlands) * Lonsdale or Lunesdale (Lancashire-Westmorland) *

Rochdale Rochdale ( ) is a town in Greater Manchester, England, and the administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough of Rochdale. In the United Kingdom 2021 Census, 2021 Census, the town had a population of 111,261, compared to 223,773 for the wid ...

(Greater Manchester) * Teesdale (Durham) * Tweeddale (Scottish Lowlands) *

Tynedale __NOTOC__ Tynedale was a local government district in Northumberland, England. The district had a resident population of 58,808 according to the 2001 census. The main towns were Hexham, Haltwhistle and Prudhoe. The district contained part of ...

(Northumberland) * Weardale (County Durham and Yorkshire) * Wensleydale or Yoredale (Yorkshire) *

Yorkshire Dales The Yorkshire Dales are a series of valleys, or Dale (landform), dales, in the Pennines, an Highland, upland range in England. They are mostly located in the Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county of North Yorkshire, but extend into C ...

The name

Wuppertal Wuppertal (; ) is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, in western Germany, with a population of 355,000. Wuppertal is the seventh-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia and List of cities in Germany by population, 17th-largest in Germany. It ...

(

North Rhine-Westphalia North Rhine-Westphalia or North-Rhine/Westphalia, commonly shortened to NRW, is a States of Germany, state () in Old states of Germany, Western Germany. With more than 18 million inhabitants, it is the List of German states by population, most ...

) is similar in form.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dale (Origin) Landforms Bodies of water Slope landforms Valleys