A historical survey of the pre-cretaceous geology of New Zealand

Abstract

Abstract Our knowledge of the pre-Cretaceous geology of New Zealand is reviewed historically from the 1840s to mid-1965, with stress laid on patterns of development, and the interrelationships and differing philosophies of field geologists and specialist personnel in University and Geological Survey. The contribution made through policy by Directors of the Geological Survey is outlined, and tribute paid to them and to government for the balance maintained between geological research and particular economic problems. The study of sedimentary deposits has fallen into three phases: the first during the Victorian era, when under Hector a small gifted staff travelled the entire country and paid considerable attention to the older as well as the younger rocks; the second, lasting until after the Second World War, when the older rocks suffered something of an eclipse, with a rise in emphasis on the Tertiary and Cretaceous because of their oil and coal potential; and the third, lasting to the present, when renewed attention was given to the older rocks, and consequent great advances made in understanding the geological structure and global position of the country. Paleontology on pre-Cretaceous fossils was carried out chiefly by British and local university staff until after the Second World War; and the study of petrology owed much to university staff, apart from a brief flowering under Bell (1904–1911), until the appointment at the Geological Survey of a petrologist in 1938. In both fields the chief advances have been made by a few individuals gifted with sufficient drive to thrust to the heart of problems, and exhaust them, at least to the level of current world thinking. In many respects, New Zealand geologists have kept pace with world progress, though a number of fields have been woefully neglected. Very rarely indeed have our scientists actually led the way, but a few perhaps belong to the elite, most creative of geologists, who have helped to remould world understanding of geological problems. These themes are brought out in a series of more or less self-contained essays on the study of each of the major pre-Cretaceous periods, as well as sections on “undifferentiated strata”, schists, and intrusives, accompanied by graphs to summarise the staff position and progress of mapping by the Geological Survey, together with diagrams on paleontological work and the varying ages assigned to the formation of igneous and metamorphic rocks throughout the last hundred years.