Although Illinois has been nicknamed the “Prairie State,” many parts of it are hilly and scenic. The idea of large areas of the state being nothing more than broad, flat prairies has come about because the major highways have been built to take advantage of the comparatively low, gently rolling landscape rather than the rougher more scenic areas.

Physiography is the study of the creation and gradual change of land surface forms (the landscape). Thus, the land surface as we see it today in each of the physiographic provinces (fig. 1) has had a particular history of development.

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