Relict

A relict is a surviving remnant of a natural phenomenon.

Biology

A relict (or relic) is an organism that at an earlier time was abundant in a large area but now occurs at only one or a few small areas.

Geology and geomorphology

In geology, a relict is a structure or mineral from a parent rock that did not undergo metamorphosis when the surrounding rock did, or a rock that survived a destructive geologic process.

In geomorphology, a relict landform is a landform formed by either erosive or constructive surficial processes that are no longer active as they were in the past.

A glacial relict is a cold-adapted organism that is a remnant of a larger distribution that existed in the ice ages.

Human populations

As revealed by

, a relict population is an ancient people in an area, who have been largely supplanted by a later group of migrants and their descendants.

In various places around the world, minority

Other uses

• In ecology, an ecosystem which originally ranged over a large expanse, but is now narrowly confined, may be termed a relict.^[2]
• In agronomy, a relict crop is a crop which was previously grown extensively, but is now only used in one limited region, or a small number of isolated regions.
• In
  riparian property owner.^[3]
• "Relict" was an ancient term still used in colonial (British) America, and in England and Ireland of that era, now archaic, for a widow; it has come to be a generic or collective term for widows and widowers.
• In historical linguistics, a relict is a word that is a survivor of a form or forms that are otherwise archaic.

See also

• The dictionary definition of relict at Wiktionary
• Endemism
• Hysteresis
• Living fossil
• Refugium (population biology)
• Relic
• Palaeochannel

References