A database dump contains a record of the table structure and/or the data from a database and is usually in the form of a list of SQL statements. A database dump is most often used for backing up a database so that its contents can be restored in the event of data loss. Corrupted databases can often be recovered by analysis of the dump. Database dumps are often published by free software and free content projects, to allow reuse or forking of the database.
References
Database dump Wikipedia(Text) CC BY-SA