The southwestern part of the United States is a pretty dry area. Here you find quite a few mesa landforms. In other dry areas around the world you also find mesas - such as Spain, North Africa, South Africa, Arabia, India and Australia.

The word mesa is a Spanish word for table. It is a good word for this type of landform since mesas have flat tops.

Related Terms
hill - a mesa is a hill with a flat top
plateau - a plateau is like a mesa, but larger
butte - a butte is also a flat topped hill, smaller than a mesa
cliff - the sides of a mesa usually have very steep cliffs
desert - many mesas are found in dry areas that are considered deserts