Physical geography
By 1911, the definition of physiography in "Encyclopædia Britannica" had evolved to be "In popular usage the words 'physical geography' have come to mean geography viewed from a particular standpoint rather than any special department of the subject. The popular meaning is better conveyed by the word physiography, a term which appears to have been introduced by Linnaeus, and was reinvented as a substitute for the cosmography of the Middle Ages by Professor Huxley. Although the term has since been limited by some writers to one particular part of the subject, it seems best to maintain the original and literal meaning. In the stricter sense, physical geography is that part of geography which involves the processes of contemporary change in the crust and the circulation of the fluid envelopes. It thus draws upon physics for the explanation of the phenomena with the space-relations of which it is specially concerned. Physical geography naturally falls into three divisions, dealing respectively with the surface of the lithosphere – geomorphology; the hydrosphere – oceanography; and the atmosphere – climatology. All these rest upon the facts of mathematical geography, and the three are so closely inter-related that they cannot be rigidly separated in any discussion".