DCHP-1 Online

coteau [< F côteau hillock]

• 1 n. Obs. (except in place names) a small hill; also, the slope of a low hill.

  • 1767  Also another Lot of Land, situate at the Grande Coteau, One Acre in Front and about Thirty Acres deep.
  • 1875  The saving on the line by St. Esprit is much reduced by the heavy work required at "the coteau."
  • 1924  An attempt was made to ascertain the actual consumption of goods by Upper Canada, by stationing a joint inspector at the Coteau du Lac, at whose office all boats and carriages passed from Lower Canada into Upper Canada.

• 2 n. West an elevated plateau or a series of such plateaus having the appearance of a range of hills or ridges when viewed from the adjacent prairie.

  See also: high prairies  

  • 1843  For seven miles our route led west-north-west . . . it then changed to west . . . through a more open country, consisting of rising grounds, or "côteaus," with bare ridges, and sides clothed with dwarf poplar and brushwood.
  • 1872  (1873)  Warned by tradition of the frightful losses of earlier times from the ravages of small-pox, the Assineboines this year kept far out in the great central prairie along the coteau, and escaped the infection altogether.
  • 1938  . . . the Force . . . climbed the coteau twice in the next few days. . . .
  • 1963  Except for the great cattle country of the Cypress Hills and Milk River, only the wrinkled Coteau [des Prairies] remained as isolated range. . . .