AEMNNOT (2)

Word of the Week

A feature wherein TileHead highlights a word that is is especially interesting or unusual (and, incidentally, useful in Scrabble play):

AEMNNOT (2)

(unscramble the letters to form this week's word...)

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(answer below, after a little more spoiler space....)

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This week's word is...

MONTANE (n. pl. -S)

• Definition:
  1. (n.) the belt of vegetation situated in the usually moist, cool slopes just below the tree line of a mountain
  2. (adj.) of or relating to the belt of vegetation just below the tree line of a mountain
  3. (adj.) of, living in, or relating to mountains or mountainous country

• Front hooks: (none)
• Back hooks: -S
• Anagrams:NONMEAT (adj., not containing meat)
• Longer extensions: TRA-, INTER-, TRANS-, ULTRA-
• Wraparounds:TRA(MONTANE)S, ULTRA(MONTANE)S
• Other Spellings: (none)
• Related Forms: ULTRAMONTANISM (n. pl. -S), in addition to the extensions listed above

TileHead says:

Not surprisingly, this word derives from the Latin montanus ("mountain").  MONTANE regions specifically lie below the ALPINE (the highest, treeless regions) and the SUBALPINE (the thinly populated region around the tree line) zones of mountains.   Each zone has distinct flora and fauna varieties.

Females from montane populations reached sexual maturity at a later age and at a larger size than lowland females.
– Kentwood David Wells, Ecology and Behavior of Amphibians (2007)

By extension, TRAMONTANE and TRANSMONTANE can both mean "dwelling or situated beyond or to the far side of the mountains" and INTERMONTANE means "dwelling or situated between mountains." 

The inhabitants of the United States according to the first census numbered somewhat less than four millions, of which, by the most liberal estimate, the entire transmontane region contained not more than two hundred and seventy-five thousand.
– Wilbur Henry Siebert, Legacy of the American Revolution to the British West Indies and Bahamas (1913)

The Rocky Mountains are a series of ranges and intermontane valleys loosely connected along a 2000-kilometer northwest-to-southeast axis across seven states.
– William Lawrence Baker, Fire Ecology in Rocky Mountain Landscapes (2009)

Finally, perhaps the most unusual related word is ULTRAMONTANE, which can mean "dwelling or situated beyond the mountains" but also has several historical meanings related to Catholicism, including "a strong adherent or supporter of papal authority": the connection lies in the fact that the traditional Roman papal location is beyond the Alps, or ultramontane, to most of Europe.  Such a person was an adherent of ULTRAMONTANISM, a topic of debate in certain political and religious circles in the late 19th century.

The success of ultramontanism seemed to Gladstone to mark a major crisis in the progress of 'civic individuality' in Europe, as well as in its effect on Anglican-Roman relations in England and on the Irish situation.
– Henry Colin Gray Matthew, Gladstone 1809-1898 (1997)