Abutment
An abutment is, generally, the point where two structures or objects meet. This word comes from the verb abut, which means adjoin or having common boundary. An abutment is an engineering term that describes a structure located at the ends of a bridge, where the bridge slab adjoins the approaching roadway. This structure is basically a retaining wall designed to carry the loading conditions present in bridge structures. In architecture an abutment is formed of "solid masonry placed to resist the lateral pressure of a vault" (Nikolaus Pevsner). Specifically, an abutment may be the part of a structure that supports an arch.
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Famous quotes containing the word abutment:
“Once it chanced that I stood in the very abutment of a rainbow’s arch, which filled the lower stratum of the atmosphere, tinging the grass and leaves around, and dazzling me as if I looked through colored crystal. It was a lake of rainbow light, in which, for a short while, I lived like a dolphin. If it had lasted longer it might have tinged my employments and my life.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)