Elsevier's Encyclopedia of Quaternary Science is one of the world's leading collections of the latest research results on the Quaternary. It publishes materials developed by leading experts under the guidance of an international editorial board.
The latest, third edition of the monograph, includes a chapter "Dry valleys and dells" co-authored by Prof. Danuta Dzieduszyńska and Prof. Joanna Petera-Zganiacz (Department of Geology and Geomorphology at the University of Lodz Faculty of Geographical Sciences). The other co-authors are scientists from Great Britain, Prof. Julian Murton and Dr John Barlow (Permafrost Laboratory, University of Sussex).
The chapter describes the features and origins of the aforementioned geomorphological forms, based on two classic locations of their occurrence in Europe: the Polish Lowlands and the English chalklands. As the scientists point out, dry valleys and dells constitute a very important element of the landscape around Lodz, especially the so-called edge zone of the Lodz Heights, where their density reaches up to 20 per square kilometre. Dry valleys are polygenetic landforms that formed on different time scales of the Cenozoic era. Dry valleys and spatially related basins (dells) are particularly well developed in those regions where the last feature of Pleistocene morphogenesis was formed under the influence of cold periglacial conditions.
On the Polish Lowlands, dry valleys are cut in unconsolidated sediments deposited during the penultimate cold period of the Pleistocene (Saalian – Central Polish glaciation complex). The second region with the widespread presence of these formations is the area in the south-west of the British Isles, where they developed on Cretaceous substrates over extended periods when the climate repeatedly fluctuated between periglacial and temperate conditions.
The term dry valley, in the context of forms formed under periglacial conditions, is used to describe longitudinal concave forms cutting morphological edges of various origins. They have been formed mainly by periglacial denudation, transport transverse to the axis of the form and periodic longitudinal transport processes leading to the removal of denuded material. Dry valleys, characterised by distinctly shaped slopes and a flat bottom, were formed by erosional processes that followed the surface of the frozen ground, mainly flushing and solifluction. The associated basins are smaller shallower depressions, usually bowl-shaped, and were probably shaped by erosion associated with surface-deposited thick snow patches (nivation).
Source: Dzieduszyńska, D.A., Petera-Zganiacz, J., Murton, J. and Barlow, J. (2025) Dry valleys and dells. In: Elias, S. (eds.) Encyclopedia of Quaternary Science, 3rd Edition. Vol. 5, pp. 325-355.UK: Elsevier. dx.doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-323-99931-1.00069-6