Observations on the Relative Ages of the Leading Physical Features and Lines of Elevation of the Carboniferous District of Lancashire and Yorkshire

Abstract

T he approach to completion of the Geological Survey of South and Mid-Lancashire enables me to draw up the following observations on the ages of its physical features. This district, it may be observed, lies immediately to the south-west of that which has been so faithfully illustrated by Professor Phillips in his well-known ‘Geology of Yorkshire.’ The most prominent feature of the tract now to be considered is Pendle Hill (1831 feet); and as this hill is but the culminating point of a long range of parallel escarpments, physically one, stretching through a distance of 30 miles from W.S.W. to E.N.E. in Lancashire, and continued into Yorkshire, I shall take the liberty of applying the term “Pendle Ranger,rd to the whole of this line of hills. This range commences at Parbold Hill, near Ormskirk, on the south-west, takes a straight course into Yorkshire by Hoghton Tower, Blackburn, and Whalley, and, forming the south-easterly side of the Vale of Clitheroe, continues its course towards Colne and Skipton. It generally consists of a double group of ridges, often rocky and serried, ranging in parallel lines, with intervening valleys. The chain, when cut through transversely near its centre, presents in structure the segment of a great arch (see fig. 1) of which the axis passes by Clitheroe, and along which the Carboniferous Limestone reaches the surface. This axis may be traced from the banks of the river Darwen, near Roach Bridge, through Mellor, Clitheroe, by Skipton and Bolton Abbey into Knaresborough Forest, as indicated