Greenbrier

Greenbrier is the common name of the plant genus Smilax. It may also refer to:

Places in the United States

Other uses

See also

Smilax

Smilax is a genus of about 300–350 species, found in temperate zones, tropics and subtropics worldwide. In China for example about 80 are found (39 of which are endemic), while there are 20 in North America north of Mexico. They are climbing flowering plants, many of which are woody and/or thorny, in the monocotyledon family Smilacaceae, native throughout the tropical and warm temperate regions of the world. Common names include catbriers, greenbriers, prickly-ivys and smilaxes. "Sarsaparilla" (also zarzaparrilla, sarsparilla) is a name used specifically for the Jamaican S. regelii as well as a catch-all term in particular for American species. Occasionally, the non-woody species such as the smooth herbaceous greenbrier (S. herbacea) are separated as genus Nemexia; they are commonly known by the rather ambiguous name "carrion flowers".

Greenbriers get their scientific name from the Greek myth of Crocus and the nymph Smilax. Though this myth has numerous forms, it always centers around the unfulfilled and tragic love of a mortal man who is turned into a flower, and a woodland nymph who is transformed into a brambly vine.

Greenbrier (Great Smoky Mountains)

Coordinates: 35°42′25″N 83°22′59″W / 35.7069°N 83.3831°W / 35.7069; -83.3831

Greenbrier is a valley in the northern Great Smoky Mountains of Tennessee, located in the Southeastern United States. Now a recreational area, Greenbrier was once home to a string of Appalachian communities.

Greenbrier is situated along the Middle Fork of the Little Pigeon River, stretching from Porters Flat in the south to Emert's Cove in the north, at the present park boundary. The area also includes the Middle Fork's immediate watershed from the crest of Grapeyard Ridge to the west (opposite the Roaring Fork area) to Snag Mountain in the east. The area is sometimes called Big Greenbrier to distinguish it from Little Greenbrier, which is located between Wears Valley and Elkmont several miles to the west.

Geology

The ridges surrounding Greenbrier are among the highest in the Appalachian range. To the east is the Guyot massif, which rises to over 6,000 feet (1,829 m) for long stretches. To the west is the Le Conte massif, which culminates in a 6,593-foot (2,009 m) summit. The ridge immediately to the south connecting the two massifs, known as "the Sawteeth," consists of a series of jagged, steep cliffs, the most well-known of which spans the northern face of Charlies Bunion. Greenbrier Pinnacle, a 7-mile (11 km) ridge descending from the western flank of Old Black westward to the Middle Fork valley, nearly closes off Greenbrier Cove entirely. Over a dozen streams flow north from the crest of the Pinnacle, each of them cutting narrow hollows with traces of fertile bottomland.