terrace

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
terrace/ˈterəs/

▶noun

• 1 a level paved area adjoining a building.

• 2 each of a series of flat areas on a slope, used for cultivation.

  ■ Brit. a flight of wide, shallow steps providing standing room for spectators in a stadium.

  ■ Geology a natural horizontal shelf-like formation, such as a raised beach.

• 3 Brit. a row of houses built in one block in a uniform style.

▶verb make or form (sloping land) into terraces.

– derivatives
terracing noun.

– origin C16: from OFr., lit. ‘rubble, platform’, based on L. terra ‘earth’.