Elaine Castle is a 7,431-foot-elevation (2,265 meter) summit located in the Grand Canyon, in

Coconino County Coconino County is a county in the north-central part of the U.S. state of Arizona. Its population was 145,101 at the 2020 census. The county seat is Flagstaff. The county takes its name from ''Cohonino'', a name applied to the Havasupai p ...

of northern

Arizona Arizona ( ; nv, Hoozdo Hahoodzo ; ood, Alĭ ṣonak ) is a state in the Southwestern United States. It is the 6th largest and the 14th most populous of the 50 states. Its capital and largest city is Phoenix. Arizona is part of the Fou ...

, US. It is situated three miles north-northwest of King Arthur Castle near the head of Shinumo Creek, and immediately southwest of Lancelot Point.

Topographic relief Terrain or relief (also topographical relief) involves the vertical and horizontal dimensions of land surface. The term bathymetry is used to describe underwater relief, while hypsometry studies terrain relative to sea level. The Latin w ...

is significant as it rises above Merlin Abyss in one mile. According to the

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

system, Elaine Castle is located in a

cold semi-arid climate A semi-arid climate, semi-desert climate, or steppe climate is a dry climate sub-type. It is located on regions that receive precipitation below potential evapotranspiration, but not as low as a desert climate. There are different kinds of semi-ar ...

zone.

History

Clarence Dutton Clarence Edward Dutton (May 15, 1841 – January 4, 1912) was an American geologist and US Army officer. Dutton was born in Wallingford, Connecticut on May 15, 1841. He graduated from Yale College in 1860 and took postgraduate courses there until ...

started the tradition of naming geographical features in the Grand Canyon after mythological deities and heroic figures. Elaine Castle was named by cartographer Richard Tranter Evans (1881–1966), after

Elaine of Astolat Elaine of Astolat (), also known as Elayne of Ascolat and other variants of the name, is a figure in Arthurian legend. She is a lady from the castle of Astolat who dies of her unrequited love for Sir Lancelot. Well-known versions of her story appe ...

, from the

Legend of King Arthur King Arthur ( cy, Brenin Arthur, kw, Arthur Gernow, br, Roue Arzhur) is a legendary king of Britain, and a central figure in the medieval literary tradition known as the Matter of Britain. In the earliest traditions, Arthur appears as a ...

, in keeping with an Arthurian naming theme for other geographical features in the vicinity, e.g. ''King Arthur Castle'', '' Guinevere Castle'', ''Excalibur'', ''Gawain Abyss'', ''

Holy Grail Temple Holy Grail Temple is a summit located in the Grand Canyon, in Coconino County, Arizona, Coconino County of northern Arizona, Southwestern United States, US. It is situated seven miles north-northeast of Havasupai Point, and two miles west-northw ...

'', ''Bedivere Point'', ''Lancelot Point'', and ''Galahad Point''. This feature's name was officially adopted in 1908 by the

U.S. Board on Geographic Names The United States Board on Geographic Names (BGN) is a federal body operating under the United States Secretary of the Interior. The purpose of the board is to establish and maintain uniform usage of geographic names throughout the federal govern ...

. Donald Davis climbed Elaine Castle on June 27, 1969, placing the first cairn on Elaine, but was not the first person there as he found evidence that Native Americans had been there.Aaron Tomasi, Pernell Tomasi, ''Grand Canyon Summits Select An Obscure Compilation of Sixty-nine Remote Ascent Routes in the Grand Canyon National Park Backcountry'', 2001, , page 30.

Harvey Butchart John Harvey Butchart (May 10, 1907 – May 29, 2002) was a mathematics professor who was well known for his hiking exploits in and around the Grand Canyon in Arizona, United States. Beginning in 1945, Butchart explored the Grand Canyon's backco ...

climbed it on August 9, 1969, finding the cairn that Davis had built.

Geology

This

butte __NOTOC__ In geomorphology, a butte () is an isolated hill with steep, often vertical sides and a small, relatively flat top; buttes are smaller landforms than mesas, plateaus, and tablelands. The word ''butte'' comes from a French word me ...

is composed of a

Permian The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.9 Mya. It is the last ...

Toroweap Formation The Middle Permian Toroweap Formation is a thin, darker geologic unit, between the brighter colored units of the Kaibab Limestone above, and Coconino Sandstone below. It is a prominent unit in Grand Canyon, Arizona, USA, found through section ...

caprock Caprock or cap rock is a more resistant rock type overlying a less resistant rock type,Kearey, Philip (2001). ''Dictionary of Geology'', 2nd ed., Penguin Reference, London, New York, etc., p. 41.. . analogous to an upper crust on a cake that is ha ...

on cream-colored Permian

Coconino Sandstone Coconino Sandstone is a geologic formation named after its exposure in Coconino County, Arizona. This formation spreads across the Colorado Plateau province of the United States, including northern Arizona, northwest Colorado, Nevada, and Utah. ...

. This sandstone, which is the third-youngest stratum in the Grand Canyon, was deposited 265 million years ago as sand dunes. Below the Coconino Sandstone is reddish slope-forming, Permian

Hermit Formation The Permian Hermit Formation, also known as the Hermit Shale, is a nonresistant unit that is composed of slope-forming reddish brown siltstone, mudstone, and very fine-grained sandstone. Within the Grand Canyon region, the upper part of the ...

, which in turn overlays the Pennsylvanian-Permian Supai Group. Further down are strata of the cliff-forming Mississippian

Redwall Limestone The Redwall Limestone is a resistant cliff-forming unit of Mississippian age that forms prominent, red-stained cliffs in the Grand Canyon, ranging in height from to . Lithology Redwall Limestone consists predominantly of light-olive-gray to ...

, and slope-forming Cambrian

Tonto Group The Tonto Group is a name for an assemblage of related sedimentary strata, collectively known by geologists as a ''Group'', that comprises the basal sequence Paleozoic strata exposed in the sides of the Grand Canyon. As currently defined, the T ...

. Elaine Castle owes its isolation to lines of fracture.Noble, L. F., ''The Shinumo Quadrangle, Grand Canyon District, Arizona'', Bulletin 549, United States Geological Survey, Department of the Interior, (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1914), page 79. Precipitation

runoff Runoff, run-off or RUNOFF may refer to: * RUNOFF, the first computer text-formatting program * Runoff or run-off, another name for bleed, printing that lies beyond the edges to which a printed sheet is trimmed * Runoff or run-off, a stock marke ...

from Elaine Castle drains south to the

Colorado River The Colorado River ( es, Río Colorado) is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and northern Mexico. The river drains an expansive, arid watershed that encompasses parts of seven U.S. s ...

via Shinumo Creek.

References

External links

Elaine Castle photo
Kaibab.org
Elaine Castle with Holy Grail Temple
photo at Kaibab.org
Photo of Elaine Castle from Lancelot Point
by

Elaine Castle photo
by Harvey Butchart * Weather forecast
National Weather Service
{{Geology of the Grand Canyon area, , state=collapsed Grand Canyon Landforms of Coconino County, Arizona Mountains of Arizona North American 2000 m summits Colorado Plateau Grand Canyon National Park Grand Canyon, North Rim Sandstone formations of the United States

History

Geology

See also

References

External links