Cycle of erosion

The model

William Morris Davis, the originator of the model, divided it into stages whose transition is gradual. The model begins with an uplifted or to-be-uplifted landscape. Then Davis defined a youthful stage where river incision is the dominant process shaping the landscape. During the youthful stage height differences between uplands and valley bottoms increase rapidly. The youthful stage is followed by a mature stage where height differences between valley bottoms and uplands are greatest. Beginning in the mature stage slope decrease becomes a more important phenomenon and uplands lose height more rapidly than rivers incise, effectively diminishing relief. In the very latest stage erosion has acted so long that the landscape – despite original height – is reduced into a rolling lowland. This landscape of low relief is called a peneplain and may contain residual heights standing out from the general level. The peneplain can be uplifted starting a second erosion cycle.

The model assumes rapid and episodic tectonic uplift and that slopes evolve by decline, meaning that initially steep slopes are worn out by erosion forming successively gentler slopes. Weaknesses of the model are that it is mostly theoretical and deductive in nature; further it does not take into account the complexity of tectonic movements or climate change. The nature of surface processes is also poorly represented by the model. The model in its original form is intended to explain relief development in temperate landscapes where erosion by running water is assumed to be of prime importance. Nevertheless, the cycle of erosion has been extended, with modifications, into arid, glacial, coastal, karst and periglacial areas.

Early acclaim and criticism

After the model was first developed by William Morris Davis around 1900 it received wide acclaim, but was never universally accepted. The initial enthusiasm and strength of the cycle of erosion model has been attributed to various causes. First, the model provided a framework to study areas and epochs in Earth history where erosion is the dominant process. Second, the model fitted well into the grand evolutionary thought that had emerged in the 19th century with Darwin's evolution theory. Lastly, some popularity was indebted to Davis's lucid writing style. The model achieved its greatest popularity in the 1900–39 period when numerous studies on denudation chronology based on the model were published. In these studies usually two to five erosion cycles were identified. The approach of doing denudation chronology with the cycle of erosion model lost popularity from the 1930s onward. Arguably this was so because the approach did not provide any unforeseeable insights. An increasing number of geomorphologists had begun to study processes happening in the present and not in the past as done with the cycle of erosion model. These process geomorphologists soon realized some of their observations were at odds with Davis's model. Other geomorphologists turned away from the cycle of erosion to work instead on climatic or tectonic geomorphology.

While the model was at first widely accepted among Anglo-Saxon scholars, in Continental Europe it met some resistance with German scholars Albrecht and Walther Penck, Siegfried Passarge and Alfred Hettner standing out as early opponents to the model. Walther Penck and Lester Charles King proposed alternative cycle theories in the 1920s and 1960s respectively.

Intensified criticism (1960s)

While King's ideas were an attempt at refuting Davis's cycle of erosion they were themselves of cyclical nature and contributed to ushering in a wave of criticism in 1960s against both his and Davis's models. This criticism has been called "Davis bashing" by Cliff Ollier and constitutes to Ollier the ridicule of cyclical theories in geomorphology without any alternative model being proposed.

The notions of time, uplift, slope and drainage density evolution in the erosion cycle have been criticized. Further the validity of some whole concepts associated with the cycle of erosion have been questioned including stream grade, base level and most of all that of peneplains.

Writing in 1971 geomorphologist Ronald Flemal summarized the situation as follows:

Modern status

Despite considerable criticism the cycle of erosion model has remained part of the science of geomorphology. The model or theory has never been proved wrong, but neither has it been proven. The inherent difficulties of the model have instead made geomorphological research to advance along other lines. In contrast to its disputed status in geomorphology, the cycle of erosion model is a common approach used to establish denudation chronologies, and is thus an important concept in the science of historical geology. While acknowledging its shortcomings modern geomorphologists Andrew Goudie and Karna Lidmar-Bergström have praised it for its elegancy and pedagogical value respectively.