Great Limestone Research Articles

Paleozoic Geology of North and West Sides of Uinta Basin, Utah

Paleozoic Geology of North and West Sides of Uinta Basin, Utah

Some Routes in Southern Iran

THE Kingdom of Iran has acquired a new interest in the course of the last year as a corridor to South Russia from Britain or America via the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf. The nearest point on the Indian Ocean to the Caspian Sea is 800 miles, and Chahbar, the only first-rate natural harbour on the whole of the Persian coast, is 900 miles away. The Persian Gulf comes closer, its nearest point lying 460 miles in a straight line from the shores of the Caspian. The land bridge to be traversed is a long one therefore, and physical obstacles, climatic harshness, and political insecurity have often combined to make it a difficult crossing. Wayfarers down the ages have tried a variety of routes and dwellers in Iran have sought still others on journeys from their inland cities in search of trade. Some rather easy routes exist between the cities along the grain of the country from north-west to southeast, but to get out either north-east or south-west there is no easy way, no alternative detour, and hardships have to be faced. Southern Iran can provide plenty of them. The pattern of the country explains the need for inland routes and some of the difficulties in providing them. The coast of south and south-western Iran forms an obtuse angle which bends from east-west to north-west-south-east a little west of Jask. It is washed by the Indian Ocean to Jask and by the waters of the Persian Gulf for nearly 600 miles beyond. The frontier then skirts the plains of 'Iraq for nearly 400 miles. Inside, plains and foothills form an outer zone where grilling summers are followed by temperate muddy winters. A mountain zone comes next. In the south the mountains are seldom as much as 7000 feet high, and although rough and stony, they can be crossed at selected cols of no more than 5000 feet. The mountain belt behind the shores of the Gulf has an open texture. Great whaleback limestone mountains rise one after another en echelon up to heights of 12,000 feet from a plain over which they are dotted so sparingly that the individuals do not jostle one another but have ample spaces around them to allow for easy roundabout passage. Farther north where the Gulf gives way to Mesopotamia the

VI. The algal sediments of Andros Island, Bahamas

In the course of a geological reconnaissance of Andros Island, in the Bahamas, it was found that the lower forms of plant life, especially the Blue-green Algæ, play an important part in the process of sedimentation. In addition to those forms which actively contribute calcium carbonate to the sediment, there are other species which function primarily as sediment binders, without necessarily precipitating any lime themselves. Such sediment-binding algæ usually impart characteristic structures to the medium in which they grow; and in the interior of Andros, where such deposits are now accumulating over large areas, structures are being produced which are reminiscent of those found in some of the great limestone formations of the Lower Palaeozoic and Upper Precambrian. In view of this, and of the supposed algal origin of certain of these limestone structures, it is felt that a detailed description of the Bahaman sedi- merits will provide an example of a modem Cyanophyceous deposit, which, may prove useful for comparison with older limestones of similar structure.

The Lynchet Groups of Upper Wharfedale, Yorkshire

The area considered in this study is roughly the drainage of the Wharfe and its tributary the Skirfare, above Burnsall, a typical ‘Yorkshire Dale’. The valley is excavated through the Yoredale series of alternating limestones, shales, and sandstones, into the Great Scar Limestone, the lowest member of the Carboniferous series. This lower limestone forms very imposing and massive scars along the valley sides, above which the fells rise in a series of steps and scars corresponding with the limestone and sandstone outcrops. The valley bottom is occupied by a series of glacial lake flats and moraines which have played a very important part in the settlement of the valley, the lake flats being swamp until recently drained, and still liable to flood through a great part of winter, the moraines providing dry crossing places and village sites throughout the upper dale. The dale under discussion is about 20 miles long, and from ¼ to ½ mile wide between the lower scars of limestone. The valley floor rises from 500 ft. above sea-level at Burnsall to 1250 ft. at the head of the valley near Oughtershaw,while the top of the first scar varies from 800 ft. to about 1600 ft., being a platform of good pasture about a third of a mile wide, on each side of the valley.

The Geology of Roade Cutting

Roade cutting was considered to be one of the great works in the construction of the original London and Birmingham Railway (afterwards the London and North-Western Railway) between 1833 and 1838, being about 1½ mile in length, of considerable average depth, a good part of which consisted of hard rock—the Great Oolite Limestone.

Some Observations and Experiments on Joint Planes

Previous articleNext article FreeSome Observations and Experiments on Joint PlanesPearl SheldonPearl Sheldon Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The Journal of Geology Volume 20, Number 2Feb. - Mar., 1912 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/621944 Views: 91Total views on this site Citations: 11Citations are reported from Crossref PDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Lianyang Zhang, Herbert H. Einstein The Planar Shape of Rock Joints, Rock Mechanics and Rock Engineering 43, no.11 (Jun 2009): 55–68.https://doi.org/10.1007/s00603-009-0054-0Ram Weinberger, Dov Bahat Relative fracture velocities based on fundamental characteristics of joint-surface morphology, Terra Nova 20, no.11 (Jan 2008): 68–73.https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-3121.2007.00788.xAndrea Billi, Francesco Salvini Development of systematic joints in response to flexure-related fibre stress in flexed foreland plates: the Apulian forebulge case history, Italy, Journal of Geodynamics 36, no.44 (Nov 2003): 523–536.https://doi.org/10.1016/S0264-3707(03)00086-3Shingo Kano, Noriyoshi Tsuchiya Parallelepiped cooling joint and anisotropy of P-wave velocity in the Takidani granitoid, Japan Alps, Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research 114, no.3-43-4 (May 2002): 465–477.https://doi.org/10.1016/S0377-0273(01)00301-8Francesco Salvini, Andrea Billi, Donald U Wise Strike-slip fault-propagation cleavage in carbonate rocks: the Mattinata Fault Zone, Southern Apennines, Italy, Journal of Structural Geology 21, no.1212 (Dec 1999): 1731–1749.https://doi.org/10.1016/S0191-8141(99)00120-0Emanuel J. M. Willemse, David D. Pollard On the orientation and patterns of wing cracks and solution surfaces at the tips of a sliding flaw or fault, Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth 103, no.B2B2 (Feb 1998): 2427–2438.https://doi.org/10.1029/97JB01587HERBERT H. EINSTEIN Modern Developments in Discontinuity Analysis – The Persistence–Connectivity Problem, (Jan 1993): 193–213.https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-042066-0.50016-1B. C. Wilson, H. Helmstaedt, J. M. Dixon Deformation and Intrusion in Deeply Buried Rocks: Creep, High-Angle Ductile and Brittle Shear, and Congruent Shear Arrays, (Jan 1992): 83–93.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-0833-3_7D.E. Helgeson, A. Aydin Characteristics of joint propagation across layer interfaces in sedimentary rocks, Journal of Structural Geology 13, no.88 (Jan 1991): 897–911.https://doi.org/10.1016/0191-8141(91)90085-WHerbert H. Einstein, William S. Dershowitz Tensile and shear fracturing in predominantly compressive stress fields—a review, Engineering Geology 29, no.22 (Jul 1990): 149–172.https://doi.org/10.1016/0013-7952(90)90004-KPhilip S. Doughty JOINT DENSITIES AND THEIR RELATION TO LITHOLOGY IN THE GREAT SCAR LIMESTONE, Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society 36, no.44 (Jun 2022): 479–512.https://doi.org/10.1144/pygs.36.4.479

INGLEBOROUGH. PART V. DEVONIAN AND CARBONIFEROUS

I have given great prominence to the discussion of the character and relations of the Bala and Silurian rocks because of the great interest attached to this easternmost outcrop exposed in the deep valleys which have been carved out on the east and west of Ingleborough. but this is essentially a country of Carboniferous rocks. As we stand on the great limestone terrace of Ingleborough (see PL XXIV.), and look out east across the valley of the Ribble, we see the bold outline of Penyghent, owing its profile to the alternations of sandstone, limestone, and shale which have differently resisted the various denuding agents that have for ages been at work upon it. The top of it consists of beds higher in the series than any we have on Ingleborough, and the first shoulder from the top corresponds to Ingleborough’s cap of Millstone Grit. The next shoulder is due to the massive sandstones which make up the upper part of the Yoredale rocks (the Hawes Flagstone Series), while the top of the Mountain Limestone on which we stand is seen at the foot of the steeper slopes opposite, and its scars are visible here and there projecting out towards Ribblesdale. Though we know that Bala and Silurian occur all along the bottom of the valley from Horton below us, and as far south as Stainforth, we see no features due to them. The conspicuous rounded hills are the moraine mounds of the receding glacier-ice which seems to have been long ...

The Ben Bulben District

THE region lying north of Sligo, which was visited by a large party of naturalists last July on the occasion of the fourth triennial conference of the Naturalists' Field Clubs of Ireland, is one of much beauty and interest. In its general aspect it recalls the best features of the Yorkshire Carboniferous Limestone area. Its setting, with the great limestone plain of Ireland stretching away on one hand, and the Atlantic Ocean on another, adds a dignity and impressiveness to this group of cliff-rimmed, flat-topped hills which might not be bestowed by their height alone, though they are of no mean elevation (Truskmore, the highest point, rises to 2113 feet). The Ben Bulben range, which derives its name from that of one of its spurs which projects boldly towards the Atlantic, represents the wreck of the Upper Limestone of this district. The fertile undulating low grounds all around are occupied by a lower and more argillaceous series, through which one of the old Caledonian folds of Ireland projects as a knobby ridge, its rugged outlines forming a charming contrast with the green and grey tabular forms of the limestone. The Upper Limestone, 700 feet or 800 feet thick, massive and strongly jointed vertically, rests on the lower series as a cliff-bound plateau, intersected by several grand glens, which are cut through the limestone deep into the less resisting rocks underneath. The mural precipices are the result of the characteristic weathering of the massive limestones. Below them, where not obscured by talus, the Middle Limestones and shales fall away in steep concave slopes into the plain. The exquisite valleys of Glencar and Glenade cut right through the plateau, the first in an east and west direction, the other north and south. Each is from one to two miles wide from cliff-top to cliff-top, and about a thousand feet deep (Fig. 1). The floors of these valleys are undulating, and the scenery is much enhanced by the fact that each embosoms a lake at the point where the cliff scenery reaches its best.

IV.-—The Disappearance of Limestones in High Teesdale

In High Teesdale, on certain hillsides, the structure of which is in most respects clear, the observer is struck by the disappearance of some, generally constant, limestone which ought naturally to occur. The limestone most usually missing is the Great Limestone, which, with the exception of the Melmerby Scar Limestone, is the thickest of all in the dale. Though the ground is almost free from peat and drift, and plainly shows the banks formed by the Four Fathom Limestone and Firestone, there is yet perhaps neither bank nor ‘shake-hole’ (swallow-hole) to represent the Great Limestone. In the cases referred to the difficulty cannot be accounted for by supposing that the limestone along its outcrop is thrown out by a fault, for the outcrops of the beds above and below can be followed round the hill without interruption.

III.—The Upper Devonian Fishes of Ohio

Under the true Carboniferous strata of Ohio, that is below the base of the Berea Grit, lies a mass of shale of varying colour many hundred feet in thickness. The uppermost fifty or sixty feet are often red or reddish, and have been separated with the name of the Bedford Shale. The next layer, of about the same thickness, is usually black or at least very dark and bears the name of the Cleveland Shale. Below this again is a greenish mass 500 feet or more in thickness, known as the Erie Shale. Another dark bed follows—the Huron Shale—beneath which is the great limestone base of the Devonian in Ohio, the Corniferous.

The Geognosy of the Appalachians and the Origin of Crystalline Rocks *

III.THE direct formation of the crystalline schists from an aqueous magma is a notion which belongs to an early period in geological theory. De la Beche, in 1834,+ conceived that they were thrown down as chemical deposits from the waters of the heated ocean, after its reaction on the crust of the cooling globe, and before the appearance of organic life. This view was revived by Daubree in i860. Having sought to explain the alteration of palaeozoic strata of mechanical origin, by the action of heated waters, he proceeds to discuss the origin of the still more ancient crystalline schists. The first precipitated waters, according to him, acting on the anhydrous silicates of the earth's crust, at a very elevated temperature, and at a great pressure, which he estimated at two hundred and fifty atmospheres, formed a magma, from which, as it cooled, were successively deposited the various strata of the crystalline schists. J This hypothesis, violating, as it does, all the notions which sound theory teaches |with regard to the chemistry of a cooling globe, I has, moreover, to encounter grave geognostical difficulties. The pre-Silurian crystalline rocks belong to two or more distinct systems of different ages, succeeding each other in discordant stratification. The whole history of these rocks, moreover, shows that their various alternating strata were deposited, not as precipitates from a seething solution, but under conditions of sedimentation very like those of more recent times. In the oldest known of them, the Laurentian system, great limestone formations are inters [ratified with gneisses, quartzites, and even with conglomerates. All analogy, moreover, leads us to conclude that even at this early period life existed at the surface of the planet. Great accumulations of iron-oxyd, beds of metallic sulphids, and of graphite, exist in these oldest strata, and we know of no other agency than that of organic matter capable of generating these products.

On the Palæontology of the Junction Beds of the Lower and Middle Lias in Gloucestershire

P revious to the writings of Messrs. Oppel and Wright on the classification of the various members of the Lias, that portion of the system which intervenes between the great limestone series of the Lower Lias below and the Marlstone above was referred to the Lower Lias; but these authors have drawn the line of demarcation between the Lower and Middle Lias through the mass of clays and shales which constitute the median portion of that system, the zone of Ammonites raricostatus being the uppermost member of the Lower Lias, and that of Ammonites Jamesoni the lowermost member of the Middle Lias. Now it has not been shown in any English publication that this separation harmonizes with the distribution of organic remains, and by the superficial reader the boundary-line may well be considered an arbitrary one; it will be my endeavour to establish the division of the Lower and Middle Lias as drawn by Oppel. That the zone of Ammonites capricornius is intimately connected with the Marlstone there cannot be a doubt, and in the Yorkshire Lias it has for many years been grouped with it; but as the zones of Ammonites Jamesoni and A. ibex , in this country, have usually been regarded as imperfectly fossilfferous, the necessary data for comparison being absent, the position of these zones in the Middle Lias has, with some degree of reasonableness, been questioned, more especially because the lithologieal conditions of the upper zones of the Lower Lias ( sensu stricto ) are repeated in the zone

V.—The Lead-Bearing Districts of the North of England

The district to which attention is directed is situated in the centre and the most elevated part of Great Britain, which is thickly inhabited by an industrial population, many of whom are occupied in the working of Lead-mines. The Agent's house of the Beaumont Mines is at an elevation of 1400 feet above the sea, Kilhope Law rises 2206, while Crossfell (capped by Millstone Grit) attains a height of 2901 feet; Dufton Pike 1575 feet, and the Cheviots 2676 feet, the three counties of Northumberland, Cumberland, and Durham meeting at Rampgill Head; Durham, Yorkshire, and Westmoreland at Cauldron Snout. This elevated district, bounded on the east by the Tyne and Wear Coal-field, and on the west by the Whitehaven field, chiefly consists of the Carboniferous rocks, and presents varied physical features. The Penine chain, of which Crossfell is a part, extends from the borders of Scotland to Derbyshire, and from its westerly trend it forms the watershed, whence on the east side fall the waters of the Tyne, Wear, and the Tees. The country presents a varied aspect; to the east are broad low plains, succeeded by rolling hills and dreary elevated moors, followed by a more hilly and more rugged district, rising gradually on the east side of the Penine chain, and descending more steeply on the western side. These, together with the character of the rocks, influence the vegetation of the country, as shown by the “basset” of the Great Limestone, which forms almost the boundary of cultivated land and human habitations. Above it (as Mr. Sopwith observes) are more or less brown and dreary moors, and below it the hill-sides present a green surface and flowery meadows. The counties of Northumberland and Durham occupy about 2905 square miles, three quarters of which belong to the Carboniferous strata.

On the Discovery of Human and Animal Bones in Heathery Burn Cave, Near Stanhope

In a tolerably deep ravine, surrounded by trees and brushwood growing in wild profusion, was, until lately, a cave, in that member of the carboniferous formation locally called the “Great Limestone,” and situated about one mile and a quarter north from the town of Stanhope, in the county of Durham. The limestone is now being worked for the purpose of supplying the Weardale Iron Company with a flux used in the operation of smelting their ironstone; and consequently the cave has been laid bare to the light of day.The cave was much visited a few years ago, both by strangers and persons living in the locality, but probably few of the visitors ever studied the excavating forces by means of which the cave was hollowed out of the solid limestone, and fewer still, if any, would think that they were treading on a primeval burial-place.Doubtless the excavation must be mainly due to aqueous agency, but a reference to Sir Charles Lyell's ‘Principles of Geology,’ Professor Phillips's ‘Treatise on Geology,’ and Richardson's ‘Geology,’ shows that our leading writers on this subject consider that the first cause of a cavern must have been a fracture in the limestone rock, consequent on the upheaval of the strata, and that water then finding access to the crack, would wear it out to its present dimensions.

XXVIII. Mr. Farey's reply to Mr. Bakewell's letter in our last number, &c. viz. on the great Derbyshire Fault.—Mr. B's lectures.—stage-coach Geology.—the great Southern Denudation.—Limestone resting on slate. —The great Limestone Fault, &c.

XXVIII. <i>Mr.</i> F<scp>arey</scp>'<scp>s</scp> <i>reply to Mr.</i> B<scp>akewell</scp>'<scp>s</scp> <i>letter in our last number, &amp;c. viz. on the great Derbyshire Fault.—Mr.</i> B's <i>lectures.—stage-coach Geology.—the great Southern Denudation.—Limestone resting on slate. —The great Limestone Fault, &amp;c.</i>