1. A raised level place for walking, with a vertical or a sloping front or sides faced with masonry, turf, or the like: A terrace is especially a raised walk in a garden, or a level surface formed in front of a house on naturally sloping ground, or on the bank of a river.
2. A row of houses on a level above the general surface, or on the face of a rising ground: A terrace is a series of homes of uniform style on a site slightly, if at all, raised above the level of the roadway.
3. An open, often paved area adjacent to a house serving as an outdoor living space; a patio: The couple enjoyed their evening meal outside on the terrace next to the roses.
4. A flat, narrow stretch of ground, often having a steep slope facing a river, lake, or sea: Mary and her friends walked along the seaside terrace enjoying the warm breezes.
5. Ety,mology: about 1515, "gallery, portico, balcony", later "flat, raised place for walking" (1575), from Modern French terrace.

Originating from Old French terrasse "platform (built on or supported by a mound of earth)", from Vulgar Latin terracea, feminine of terraceus "earthen, earthy".

Originating from Latin terra "earth, land". As a natural formation in geology, traced back to 1674.

A raised embankment or a gently sloping geomorphic surface of loose, unconsolidated earth material that has built up next to the sides of a river valley: The geology teacher, Mr. Lange, told his students that an alluvial terrace was a land area that came from a previously formed floodplain that was formed by a stream or river.

The alluvial terrace is also know as a built terrace, a drift terrace, a fill terrace, a stream-built terrace, a wave-built platform, and a wave-built terrace.

A narrow coastal strip covered by sand, silt, or fine gravel that slopes gently seaward; sea terrace; shore terrace: A marine terrace lies either above or below the current sea level and has been formed along a seacoast by the merging of a wave-built terrace and a wave-cut platform.

A uniformly, gently sloping land surface produced by water erosion or other marine processes; wave-cut terrace: In geology class, Susan learned about marine-cut terraces and was overjoyed when her family went to the coast and saw such a platform created by water which had worn away part of the land.