escarpment

escarpment
    n 1: a long steep slope or cliff at the edge of a plateau or
         ridge; usually formed by erosion [syn: {escarpment},
         {scarp}]
    2: a steep artificial slope in front of a fortification [syn:
       {escarpment}, {escarp}, {scarp}, {protective embankment}]
    

Escarpment \Es*carp"ment\, n. [Cf. F. escarpement.]
   A steep descent or declivity; steep face or edge of a ridge;
   ground about a fortified place, cut away nearly vertically to
   prevent hostile approach. See {Scarp}.
   [1913 Webster]
    

65 Moby Thesaurus words for "escarpment":
      abatis, advanced work, balistraria, bank, banquette,
      barbed-wire entanglement, barbican, barricade, barrier, bartizan,
      bastion, battlement, bluff, breastwork, bulwark, casemate,
      cheval-de-frise, circumvallation, cliff, contravallation,
      counterscarp, crag, curtain, demibastion, dike, drawbridge,
      earthwork, enclosure, entanglement, escarp, face, fence, fieldwork,
      fortalice, fortification, glacis, loophole, lunette, machicolation,
      mantelet, merlon, mound, outwork, palisade, palisades, parados,
      parapet, portcullis, postern gate, precipice, rampart, ravelin,
      redan, redoubt, sally port, scar, scarp, sconce, steep, stockade,
      tenaille, vallation, vallum, wall, work