This site uses cookies.
Some of these cookies are essential to the operation of the site,
while others help to improve your experience by providing insights into how the site is being used.
For more information, please see the ProZ.com privacy policy.
Explanation: I have never heard of a paved surface being described as "shallow stone". I am a British speaker, but I can't find any sign that the expression is commonly used in American English either. I have found one document about paving where the expression "shallow stone unit" is used. It refers to BS 7533, the British Standard on paving:
"Design Life Method to be used for pavements built with shallow stone units such as slabs flags and tiles as BS7533 Part 8." http://www.scotsnet.org.uk/assets/nss-section4.pdf "BS 7533 Part 4 - Code of practice for the construction of pavements of pre-cast concrete flags or natural stone slabs, which deals with the installation of these type of surfaces does recognise that shallow stone unit[s] are traditionally laid in a rigid form of construction" http://www.scotsnet.org.uk/assets/nss-section7.pdf
But these references are exceptional, and the expression is used here as a generic description of certain types of paving, not as a normal everyday term.
So I would say "shallow stone" is not an idiomatic expression for paving stones in English.
"Shallow", of course, is the opposite of "deep". It implies that the pieces of stone are relatively thin in the vertical dimension, like a shallow pool of water, and that they may be quite long and/or wide, like slabs. You wouldn't describe cobblestones, for example, as "shallow".
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 1 hr (2019-05-31 22:14:30 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
If the paved surface being described is actually made of cobblestones, "shallow stone" is a completely unsuitable term in English. I don't believe any native speaker would use it in that context.
... for example, in the picture with the cannon, and in several others, look like slate or shale stone pavers. Irregular shape and slightly irregular surface, due to the structure of these stones. Just throwing it out there, as an idea, that perhaps shallow and shale was mixed up? Although shale is more brittle than slate, it might not be ideal for high traffic areas. Here is a picture of shale stone pavers: https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https://comps.canstockp...
Yes, I'm no longer sure what we're actually talking about. I first assumed it was the road leading to the castle because that's what several pics had as a caption.
However, as you and Tony said, it's not entirely clear what the asker wants to know.
Thanks for the extra pictures. They lead me to wonder which pavement they're referring to. If it's the one in the picture with the cannon (no. 16 counting from the top, if I've counted correctly; anyway, this one: https://packlightgofast.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/IMG_5... ), then it does correspond more or less to what I'd understand by "shallow stone", though of course I wouldn't call it that. It's certainly not cobbled. There's no reason to think that this has to refer to the road leading to the castle.
I'm not sure what Alexander really needs here. I took the question at face value: "is "shallow stone" a correct term?", and "what does it really stand for?", which I took to mean "what does 'shallow stone' really mean"? Speculating on what the right term would be for this particular paving at this castle requires either knowing which non-English (Russian?) term is being translated here (and being able to translate the language in question), or knowing exactly what sort of paving this is, which can't necessarily be correctly determined from a photo. I don't see how we can usefully go any further here.
Seems logical, another way of looking at it in EN. However, it's not entirely clear what Asker needs to know for; replacing one non-standard EN expression with another close synonym may or may not be a solution to their problem.
Assuming the original writer knew what they wanted to say, it would appear they were seeking to differentiate between 'cobbles' (generally roughly cubic in nature) and 'paviours', which, irrespective of their horizontal dimentsons, are by implication 'shallower' in the vertical dimension; and that's very much what these look like to me.
Perhaps Asker would have done well to initially ask this question in RU > EN?
The word they were looking for was most likely cobblestone (so the first answer isn't really wrong, since the second question was, "What does this really stand for?"). Here's a better picture of the pavement, I guess: https://stock.adobe.com/gr_en/images/historical-district-of-...
вообще shallow stone переводится как мелкий камень в смысле неглубокий, т.е. я предполагал, что это ошибка переводчика, который переводил с русского языка. Как, например, Институт белка = Squirrel Institute :) Далее, конкорданс в Гугле cobblestone дает результат 60 000 000, а shallow stone – 60 000, т.е. в 1000 раз меньше! Как Вы думаете, о чем это говорит?
"Alexander Grabowski The local historical museum informs visitors that “The pavement was built of shallow stone in XX Century…” Can Russian native speakers inform me what does it really mean?"
This is clearly not native-speaker EN — but we don't know where the place is, nor what the original language might have been. I suspect Asker is for some reason seeking to back-translate, but it would be an enormous help if the actual situation was explained properly.
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 32 mins (2019-05-31 21:12:58 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
Га́лька — мелкий окатыш, камешек[1], окатанные в разной степени обломки природных камней горных пород диаметром от одного до 15 сантиметров.
Пласт или куча галек — Га́лечник. Более крупные окатанные осколки называют (в порядке возрастания): окатишами, кругляшами, булыжниками, голышами и валунами[2][3].
A pebble is a clast of rock with a particle size of 2 to 64 millimetres based on the Krumbein phi scale of sedimentology. Pebbles are generally considered larger than granules (2 to 4 millimetres diameter) and smaller than cobbles (64 to 256 millimetres diameter). A rock made predominantly of pebbles is termed a conglomerate. Pebble tools are among the earliest known man-made artifacts, dating from the Palaeolithic period of human history.
A beach composed chiefly of surface pebbles is commonly termed a shingle beach. This type of beach has armoring characteristics with respect to wave erosion, as well as ecological niches that provide habitat for animals and plants. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble
Vladyslav Golovaty Ukraine Local time: 17:39 Works in field Native speaker of: English, Russian
not a standard term; probably implies natural stone paving slabs
Explanation: I have never heard of a paved surface being described as "shallow stone". I am a British speaker, but I can't find any sign that the expression is commonly used in American English either. I have found one document about paving where the expression "shallow stone unit" is used. It refers to BS 7533, the British Standard on paving:
"Design Life Method to be used for pavements built with shallow stone units such as slabs flags and tiles as BS7533 Part 8." http://www.scotsnet.org.uk/assets/nss-section4.pdf "BS 7533 Part 4 - Code of practice for the construction of pavements of pre-cast concrete flags or natural stone slabs, which deals with the installation of these type of surfaces does recognise that shallow stone unit[s] are traditionally laid in a rigid form of construction" http://www.scotsnet.org.uk/assets/nss-section7.pdf
But these references are exceptional, and the expression is used here as a generic description of certain types of paving, not as a normal everyday term.
So I would say "shallow stone" is not an idiomatic expression for paving stones in English.
"Shallow", of course, is the opposite of "deep". It implies that the pieces of stone are relatively thin in the vertical dimension, like a shallow pool of water, and that they may be quite long and/or wide, like slabs. You wouldn't describe cobblestones, for example, as "shallow".
-------------------------------------------------- Note added at 1 hr (2019-05-31 22:14:30 GMT) --------------------------------------------------
If the paved surface being described is actually made of cobblestones, "shallow stone" is a completely unsuitable term in English. I don't believe any native speaker would use it in that context.
Charles Davis Spain Local time: 16:39 Works in field Native speaker of: English PRO pts in category: 8