-scape
A specified type of scene, or a representation of it.
[The ending of English landscape.]
This combining form is common and active, both to describe real scenes (cityscape, streetscape) and virtual or imaginary ones (dreamscape, mindscape). It is frequently employed to make casual formations, often used only once: Californiascape, skyscraperscape, plotscape. Escape does not belong here, being formed from Latin ex-, out, and cappa, cloak, figuratively to take off one's cloak, to throw off restraint.
Examples of words in -scape
Terms are based on English stems.
| cityscape | the visual appearance of a city or urban area; a city landscape |
| cloudscape | a scene of clouds |
| dreamscape | a landscape or scene with the strangeness or mystery characteristic of dreams |
| interiorscape | the appearance of the inside of a building, especially in relation to interior design; a mental landscape |
| mediascape | the world as it appears in the broadcasting and print media, considered to be distorted from reality in some respect |
| mindscape | a mental view of one's surroundings |
| moonscape | a view of the surface of the Moon, or an area that resembles it in barrenness and desolation |
| nightscape | a night-time view, say of a city |
| soundscape | a piece of music considered in terms of its component sounds |
| streetscape | a view of streets, or an environment of streets, especially in an urban area |
| timescape | time considered as an unchanging analogue to landscape |
| townscape | the visual appearance of a town or urban area; an urban landscape |
| xeriscape | a style of landscape design requiring little or no irrigation or other maintenance, used in arid regions (Greek xēros, dry) |
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