sand dune

plural sand dunes

1. geographyA large, semipermanent mound of windblown sand, held together by specialized plants, common along seashores and in deserts.

   So enfeebled was resolution in him that he could only palter at a fatuous picture of himself carrying Podson bodily over the lagoon and dumping him on the sand dunes.

   1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 86

   1 more example

   An anemometer constructed by the Soil Mechanics Laboratory of the Western Region, British Railways, has been installed at Dawlish Warren, near Exeter, to obtain a record of the velocity (speed and direction) of the wind. This information is used for the study of the effects of wind erosion on the sand dunes which protect the railway from the sea at that point.

   1952 August, “Wind Velocity Records at Dawlish”, in Railway Magazine, page 545

   Synonyms: dune, towan