The phrase "ancient surface" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used to describe a surface that is very old, often in contexts related to archaeology, geology, or historical studies.
Example: "The archaeologists uncovered an ancient surface that revealed insights into the civilization that once thrived in the area."
Alternatives: "old surface" or "historic surface".
It is defined by a distinct and ancient surface, known as the Pacific Paleosurface (PPS) or Atacama Paleosurface.
The results of these studies will aid in constraining the habitability of ancient surface environments on Mars, and may have implications for our understanding of the early Earth.
The emergence of airborne lidar data for studying landscape evolution and natural hazards has revolutionized our ability to document the topographic signature of active and ancient surface processes.
The surveys were conducted at selected locations, placed on the plan of excavation (approximately 5 m above the ancient surface) and near the archaeological excavation area.
Thus, when a slice of crystalline rock from deep in the crust is scraped off the remainder of the continent and is underthrust by it, much of the slice is uplifted and pushed onto the relatively flat, ancient surface of the intact portion of the continent.
Wide areas of the upland had been reduced to a uniform low relief by the time of the later Mesozoic Era (about 100 million years ago) and many remnants of the ancient surface, exhumed by erosive action from beneath a later Cretaceous cover (i.e., up to about 65 million years ago), survive in the landscape, notably in northern Queensland.
Approximately five years ago, the Working Group on Ancient Surfaces and Long-Term Landscape Evolution was created to raise planed surfaces in Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay with the aim of establishing regional correlations of planed surfaces after the formation of the Gondwanan rocks in South America.
Implementing a modified version of field methods applied in our survey of cave systems and Pleistocene cave sediments, the main goal of this systematic research focused on the identification of intact stratified remains from either stratigraphic sections or on remnants of exposed ancient surfaces.
Other worlds in the Solar System have ancient surfaces that are pockmarked with craters millions or even billions of years old.
Supplementary evidence for exposed lands may consist of thick soils developed on these ancient surfaces (Buick et al. 1995; Hoffman 1995; Ohmoto et al. 2007; Johnson et al. 2009, 2010).
A vaguely similar experiment is currently on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, on far more ancient surfaces.
