presettlement
- noun
- /ˌpriːˈsɛtəlmənt/
- More than 80% of the wetlands in most Midwestern states have been drained since presettlement time.
- presettlement forest
- presettlement landscape
- presettlement time
Examples
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To clarify the possibility of avoiding remarriage before sedentarization, I would like to offer two portraits of presettlement widowhood.
Academic text (1992) -
Restoration of landscapes to a presettlement state would be a wild and grand accomplishment.
Academic text (2001) -
In North America, one widely accepted restoration benchmark is the presettlement landscape.
Academic text (2001) -
For example, economics, trade, and religious expression tied to salmon were alive during the presettlement era, and those same relationships are evident today.
Academic text (2012) -
There has been no return to presettlement conditions because of continuing low-level disturbance and perhaps insufficient recovery time.
Academic text (2008) -
Only one forty-six-acre tract of forest remains that has never been cleared and presumably exemplifies the presettlement conditions.
Academic text (1995) -
In contrast, the YRLD is an agricultural but urbanizing landscape with scattered remnants of presettlement ecosystems.
Academic text (2007) -
Likewise, the presettlement pattern of hemlock forest may have been irretrievably lost because of logging and fire (White and Mladenoff 1994).
Academic text (2008) -
McIntosh (1972) drew the same conclusion from research in the Catskill Mountains, noting that nothing suggests that the presettlement dominance of beech or extensive hemlock forest will reemerge anytime soon, if ever.
Academic text (2008) -
The researchers are studying the presettlement ecosystems to understand how the landscape has changed over time.
Synonyms
13
5.2
An event that happens before a main event to prepare for it
The time of meetings and planning before official talks begin
A meeting and final checks before the signing of a sale
Surface Forms
Morphology
presettlement = settlement (transparent) = pre + settle + ment
Adding 'pre-' to 'settlement' clearly yields the meaning 'before a settlement or agreement'.
Etymology
Presettlement comes from pre- meaning 'before' and settlement, which can mean an 'agreement' or the act to 'settle' a dispute. So, presettlement refers to the time or papers that exist 'before' a final agreement is reached.