X.— Dating of the Ice Age in Scotland

Abstract

The important work of Peach and Horne1 has made it clear that the Scottish land-ice entering the North Sea during the maximum glaciation was deflected in two directions by the Scandinavian ice-sheet, and was therefore synchronous with the latter. As to the later stages of the Ice Age, it has been difficult to arrive at reliable conclusions with respect to real synchronism. Analogies in the arrangement of moraines and certain topographic features are too dependent on local conditions to be reliable, and have been shown to be highly deceptive in regions where another control has become possible.2 The only means of exact and reliable correlation is to be found in the annually deposited melt-varves of clay. These, by their relative variations in thickness, have been found to register the general fluctuations in the solar heat, and are thus capable of identification all over the earth. This is exactly what might be expected, if we bear in mind how insignificant are the greatest distances on our planet in comparison with the enormous distance from the sun which is practically the same to every point of the earth. The difficulty as to varve correlations between glacial sub-stages in Great Britain and other countries is due to the fact that as yet in Britain sufficiently long varve series have not been found. This is especially true in the later stages of the Ice Age. For this period, only in other countries have varve measurements as yet been definitely fixed. Distinct varves are developed This 250-word extract was created in the absence of an abstract