Abay is a recessed,coastal body of water that directly connects to a larger main body of water, such as anocean, alake, or another bay.[1][2][3] A large bay is usually called agulf,sea,sound, orbight. Acove is a small, circular bay with a narrow entrance. Afjord is an elongated bay formed by glacial action.[4]The termembayment is also used forrelated features, such as extinct bays or freshwater environments.
The land surrounding a bay often reduces the strength ofwinds and blockswaves. Bays may have as wide a variety of shoreline characteristics as other shorelines. In some cases, bays havebeaches, which "are usually characterized by a steep upper foreshore with a broad, flat fronting terrace".[5] Bays were significant in the history ofhuman settlement because they provided easy access to marine resources likefisheries.[6] Later they were important in the development of seatrade as the safeanchorage they provide encouraged their selection asports.[7]
TheUnited Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea defines a bay as a well-marked indentation in the coastline, whose penetration is in such proportion to the width of its mouth as to contain land-locked waters and constitute more than a mere curvature of the coast. An indentation, however, shall not be regarded as a bay unless its area is as large as (or larger than) that of thesemi-circle whosediameter is a line drawn across the mouth of that indentation[8][a] – otherwise, it would be referred to as abight.
Open – a bay that is widest at the mouth, flanked byheadlands.
Enclosed – a bay whose mouth is narrower than its widest part, flanked by at least onepeninsula.
Semi-enclosed – an open bay whose exit is made into narrowerchannels by one or moreislands within its mouth.
Back-barrier – a semi-enclosed bay separated from open water by one or morebarrier islands orspits.[9]
Juridicial – a legal distinction defining a bay meeting certain criterion asinland waters, and thus the waters of a state,[10][11] rather thaninternational waters or theterritorial waters of a national government a state may be sovereign to. Foremost among the criteria remains that the area impounded by the bay must be greater than that of a semicircle drawn across its mouth.[12]Among the matters impacted by the definition are the right to the seabed and its minerals, control over fishing, the right of seafarers toinnocent passage, and whether the affected coast is an international border or not.
Agulf is a largeinlet from anocean or theirseas into a landmass,[13] larger and typically (though not always) with a narrower opening than a bay.[14] The term was used traditionally for large, highly indented navigable bodies of salt water that are enclosed by the coastline.[13] Many gulfs are major shipping areas, such as thePersian Gulf,Gulf of Mexico,Gulf of Finland, andGulf of Aden.[14]
The largest bays have developed through plate tectonics. As thePaleozoic/earlyMesozoic era super-continentPangaea broke up along curved and indented fault lines, the continents moved apart and left large bays; these include theGulf of Guinea, theGulf of Mexico, and theBay of Bengal, which is the world's largest bay.[7]
Bays also form through coastal erosion by rivers and glaciers. A bay formed by a glacier is afjord.Rias are created by rivers and are characterised by more gradual slopes. Deposits of softer rocks erode more rapidly, forming bays, while harder rocks erode less quickly, leavingheadlands.
^"For the purposes of this Convention, a bay is a well-marked indentation whose penetration is in such proportion to the width of its mouth as to contain land-locked waters and constitute more than a mere curvature of the coast. An indentation shall not, however, be regarded as a bay unless its area is as large as, or larger than, that of the semi-circle whose diameter is a line drawn across the mouth of that indentation.For the purpose of measurement, the area of an indentation is that lying between the low-water mark around the shore of the indentation and a line joining the low-water mark of its natural entrance points. Where, because of the presence of islands, an indentation has more than one mouth, the semi-circle shall be drawn on a line as long as the sum total of the lengths of the lines across the different mouths. Islands within an indentation shall be included as if they were part of the water area of the indentation."[8]
^ab"Chesapeake Bay, Maryland".Maryland Manual On-Line. Maryland State Archives. November 28, 2016.Archived from the original on March 16, 2017. RetrievedMarch 21, 2017.
^"bay".Dictionary.com Unabridged. Random House, Inc.Archived from the original on March 22, 2017. RetrievedMarch 21, 2017.
^abGregory, George (1816).A Dictionary of Arts and Sciences. Vol. 2 (First American ed.). Philadelphia: Isaac Peirce. p. 269. Retrieved25 June 2020.A sea is a smaller collection of waters; as the Black Sea. A gulf is a part of the sea which is nearly surrounded with land; as the gulf of Venice. A bay has a wider entrance than a gulf; as the Bay of Biscay. A strait is a narrow passage that joins. Also see distance between Liverpool and Man United in the league table
^abDuggal, Gita. Chowdhury, Baruna Ray (ed.).Madhubun ICSE Geography 6. New Delhi: Vikas Publishing House. p. 32.ISBN9789325994645. Retrieved25 June 2020.A gulf is an inlet of an ocean or a sea deep into the land with a narrow mouth. It is more highly indented, more enclosed by the coast and larger than a bay. Some examples of gulfs are Persian Gulf, Gulf of Mexico, Gulf of Eden and Gulf of...
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