undersoil
nounEtymology From under- + soil.
1
Geography, Geology, Natural sciences The soil underneath the surface / topsoil and above the bedrock.
- It is a singular fact, that on the two great continents in the northern hemisphere […] we have the zone of perpetually frozen under-soil in a low latitude […]1845, Charles Darwin, Journal of Researches into the Natural History and Geology of the Countries Visited during the Voyage of the H.M.S. Beagle Round the World, 2nd edition, London: John Murray, Chapter , p. 249:
- But comfort me, my love, now the fires are low, Now I am broken to earth like a winter destroyed, and all Myself but a knowledge of roots, of roots in the dark that throw A net on the undersoil, which lies passive beneath their thrall.1916, D. H. Lawrence, “Discipline”, in Amores, London: Duckworth, page 37:
2 more examples
- The childish levels, the undersoil of the mind, had been turned up. She wanted to be with Nice people, away from Nasty people—that nursery distinction seeming at the moment more important than any later categories of Good and Bad or Friend and Enemy.1945, C. S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength, London: The Bodley Head, published 1965, Part Two, Chapter 5, p. 166:
- Dougal pointed out to his policemen friends the evidence of the Thames silt in the under-soil. ‘One time,’ he said, ‘the Thames was five miles wide, and it covered all Peckham.’1960, Muriel Spark, chapter 7, in The Ballad of Peckham Rye, London: Macmillan: