On the succession of the Lower Carboniferous Series to the west of Edinburgh, with special reference to the district around Cramond

Abstract

In a former paper on the lower carboniferous rocks of the district, read before this Society, I showed that the beds were bent into two anticlinal folds running north and south. The eastern anticline passes from the shore at Leith southward through St Andrew Square on to the foot of Blackford Hill, while the western anticline passes from the shore at Granton quarry through the south end of Corstorphine Hill on to Wood Hall, near Juniper Green, on the Water of Leith. I sought to show also that the syncline between these two arches was at its northern end occupied by the Wardie shales, while a much higher set of rocks covered these shales at the southern end of the syncline, namely, the sandstones of Redhall and Hailes, with the shales which overlie them. I also showed that these lower carboniferous rocks were cut through by a great fault running south-west and north-east, passing from the north-west face of Craiglockhart Hill to the north side of Edinburgh Castle, and from thence eastwards to the north end of Arthur Seat. This fault is well exposed in the Suburban Railway cutting at Meggetland, where beds of the Granton sandstone group can be seen lying nearly vertically against the red sandstones that form the base of the lower carboniferous series. On tracing this fault south-westwards it seems to skirt the south side of the Water of Leith above Colinton, and crosses that stream somewhere in the neighbourhood of Currie, whence it runs on