Volume 1

Italy / by K. Mason.

  • Great Britain. Naval Intelligence Division
Date:
1944-1945
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Italy / by K. Mason. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    40/738 page 20
    Topographical Regions The major divisions of continental and peninsular Italy can be subdivided into regions. Continental Italy divides into the Alps, including Istria, and the Northern Plain. The Alps, a continuous and high mountain range of varied rocks of all ages and kinds, which have been highly folded, displaced and distorted, line the northern frontier from the Riviera coast to Istria, where they connect with the similar mountains of Dalmatia. The division between the Alps and the Apennines behind Savona is arbitrary and is marked by no break in the range. Farther north the Alps and their foothills rise sharply from the Northern Plain. The main belts of different kinds of rock (p. 28) and the trends of the subordinate ridges are approximately parallel to the range as a whole. A few valleys follow this same direction, but the only large longi- tudinal valley in Italy is the Valtellina (F. Adda). Most of the rivers have cut transversely across the main ranges, dividing them into separate massifs. -‘I'wo of these valleys, those of the ‘Ticino and Adige, can be used to make three major subdivisions. The Western Alps, from the Cadibona pass to Lake Maggiore include two mountains over 15,000 feet, Mont Blanc (M. Bianco, 15,782 ft.), and Monte Rosa (15,217 ft.), in addition to other lofty mountains such as M. Cervino (Matterhorn), Gran Paradiso, and Monviso, and alto- gether about fifty peaks over 10,000 feet. The Central Alps from Lake Maggiore to the Dobbiaco pass and the Adige valley are wider but not so lofty. Pizzo Bernina, M. Cevedale, and Ortles exceed 12,000 feet, and again there are some fifty summits which exceed 10,000 feet, many of them on the northern frontier of the Trentino (Southern Tirol). ‘The Eastern Alps from Dobbiaco to Istria are characterized by an abundance of limestones and are generally lower than the other subdivisions. ‘They include the picturesque Dolo- mites, which, in spite of their impressiveness, have only eighteen peaks over 10,000 feet (Marmolada, 10,972 ft.). Farther east the peaks are all below 10,000 feet. Istria, although a structural con- tinuation of the Alps, forms a distinct subdivision, where a series of limestone plateaux extends, without any intervening plain, south- westward to the sea. Communications through the Alps necessarily follow the valleys, and the great transverse streams are nearly all followed by good routes. Many of the valleys, however, have gorge sections, which are difficult to traverse (e.g. F. Adige below Trento), and the absence
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