Pebbles of derived Portland chert and limestone have been found in the Upper Purbeck Beds at Friar Waddon, Dorset. The Unio Bed at this locality is of unusual lithology with derived phosphatic fossils and with fish teeth. The presence of this chert in the Upper Purbeck Beds and its apparent absence in Lower Purbeck pebble beds suggests that a major phase of silicification in the Portland Stone took place at about Middle Purbeck times. Furthermore, erosion of the Portland Beds occurred in the Weymouth region, probably on the crest of the Weymouth anticline, during Upper Purbeck times.

New calmoniids from the Lower Devonian Talacasto Formation in the Precordillera of San Juan, Argentina, extend the stratigraphic and geographic ranges of a clade including Bouleia Kozlowski, 1923 and Parabouleia Eldredge, 1972. The new genus Talacastops accommodates the Lochkovian T. zarelae sp.nov. from the Talacasto Formation and a closely related species from western Bolivia (Talacastops sp.nov. A). The diagnosis of Parabouleia is broadened to include P. eldredgei sp.nov., from Lochkovian strata in the lower part of the Talacasto Formation. Calmoniids from below the Scaphiocoelia Assemblage Zone display morphological disparity that rivals later occurrences, and do not conform to a model of gradual transformation of an acastomorph ancestor. Stratigraphic range extensions based on correction for ghost lineages imply a high diversity within Calmoniidae very early in the Devonian.

The Geiseltal fossil collection from southern Sachsen-Anhalt Germany contains remarkably well-preserved fossils of middle Eocene age. These include several crocodylian skulls, representing at least four different genera with a fifth genus represented by two mandibular rami. As sites with this many crocodylian genera are unknown in modern ecosystems, it has been hypothesized that these crocodylians may have differences in habit as compared to living crocodylians. In order to test similarities between the Geiseltal crocodylians and extant species, an analysis was conducted using geometric morphometrics to quantify shape in crocodylian skulls of all living species (n = 218) and all well-preserved crocodylian skulls of the Geiseltal fauna (n = 28). A relative warps analysis was used to quantify and compare skull shape, revealing Allognathosuchus and Boverisuchus to be very distinct from each other as well as from Asiatosuchus and Diplocynodon. Overlap in shape alone exists between some Diplocynodon and some Asiatosuchus, but there was significant difference in adult size. When compared with extant crocodylians, three Geiseltal genera occupied distinctly non-modern morphospace in the first two relative warps axes. Comparison of the diets of living crocodylians with similarly shaped skulls was used to reconstruct the prey preferences of the Geiseltal crocodylians, revealing differences in specialization. During the middle Eocene high global temperatures, partitioning of prey preference may have allowed this group to attain its higher than usual diversity, reducing the amount of direct competition.

This paper provides field and petrographic evidence believed by the authors to indicate that the Great Glen, over a lateral distance of some 40 miles between Fort William and Foyers, is flanked on the south-east by a broad crush-belt characterized by intense cataclasis and localized mylonitization. Most of the detailed evidence has not previously been published.

A geometric model is proposed to explain the quincunx pattern of punctae which characterizes most terebratuloids. This model gives the two parameters d and g, which together express the density of punctae. The pattern of punctae in dalmanelloids does not differ in its basic geometry from that of the terebratuloids and can be defined by the same parameters. This also holds for the punctate spiriferoids and the punctate orthotetid genus Streptorhynchus. The pattern of pustules in the taleolate brachiopods differs from that of the model for the quincunx pattern of punctae, but can still be expressed in terms of d and g. In this case d corresponds to the wavelength of the costellae.

Both punctae and pustules are morphologically and numerically related to the marginal setae.

In 1928 the owner of the Tanjong Perak Rubber Estate, Dr. H. Trail Skae, noticed a white, porous, and friable rock near the Estate buildings and took specimens that were ultimately sent to the Geological Survey Department for report. The rock proved to be entirely new to British Malaya and of great interest, while in view of its complicated composition I suggested in a local publication that it should be called “Vitrite”. Dr. Skae registered the name “Vitrite” as a trade-mark for this rock, which has possible uses in commerce, but it has since been discovered that the word was used during the war by a Dutch firm for a particular kind of glass used in electrical work, so the name has to be abandoned, and the only attempt I have ever made to inflict a new name on petrologists has been signally defeated.

A series of charnockitic rocks and associated cordierite-bearing rocks from Western Australia has been described and compared with charnockitic rocks from other localities. This charnockitic suite is considered to be a series of basic intrusions into an older series of paraschists. It has, in places, been considerably contaminated by assimilation of the aluminous metasediments and in such cases is now represented by cordierite-bearing rocks. The basic charnockitic rocks and their contaminated equivalents have been subsequently invaded, under deep-seated conditions by granitic magma or emanations, and now appear as recrystallized remnants of the original masses. They have suffered extensive granitization which has yielded the acid charnockites (hypersthene-alkali felspar gneisses) in which the hypersthene is considered to have been derived from the older hypersthene-bearing basic charnockites. In view of the similarity to the Indian and Antarctic charnockites it appears possible that the charnockitic rocks of these areas are of similar origin, and that charnockite (hypersthene granite) rather than being the result of crystallization from a magma, is due to the granitization of older hypersthene-bearing rocks. If charnockite is of magmatic origin then it is most probable that this magma was of palingenetic origin and that the hypersthene is a relict from the earlier rocks and not the product of crystallization of the charnockite magma. Dunn (1942, p. 23) considers that the evidence afforded by Indian rocks is not opposed to the view that the hypersthene gneisses (charnockites) are the product of partial or complete palingenesis of very deep-seated rocks which had lost their water content.

In the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society for 1925 (Q.J.G.S., vol. lxxxi, p. 113) I discussed the conditions of deposition of the Stockdale Shales of Valentian age. I had intended to make a detailed study of the deposits of later Silurian age, but circumstances have prevented this. I propose to offer a few notes on the subject which may be of use to other observers.

New K–Ar mineral dates from calc-alkaline granitoids of the Archipiélago Cabo de Hornos, in the southernmost tip of South America, range from 97 to 117 Ma. This confirms that the early Cretaceous was a period of major plutonic activity in the region and expands previous radiometric information on the Patagonian Batholith concerning migration of intrusion foci with time.

The Peloritani Mountains, in the southern part of the Calabrian Terranes, southern Italy, have been classically interpreted as the product of the Paleogene brittle deformation of the European continental back-stop of the Neotethyan subduction complex. This reconstruction conflicts with the occurrence of an Alpine metamorphic overprint that affected portions of both the Variscan metamorphic units and part of the Mesozoic sedimentary covers of the mountain belt. New field data, integrated with petrographic, micro- and meso-structural analyses and stratigraphic investigation of the syn-tectonic terrigenous covers, well constrain a Paleogene collision event along the Africa–Nubia convergent margin that caused the exhumation of the Alpine metamorphic units of the Peloritani Mountains. The syn-collisional exhumation was associated with shearing along two major Africa-verging crustal thrusts arising from the positive tectonic inversion of the former European palaeomargin. Early tectonic motions occurred within the mountain belts and produced the exhumation of the external portions of the edifice. Later tectonic motions occurred along the sole-thrust of the entire edifice and caused the definitive exhumation of the entire mountain belt. The whole crustal thrusting lasted for a period of c. 10 Ma, during the entire Oligocene. The definitive southwestward emplacement of the Peloritani Mountain Belt onto the Neotethyan accretionary wedge was followed by two Late Oligocene – Early Miocene NW–SE-oriented right lateral shear zones, replacing the previous crustal thrust. These two strike-slip belts are interpreted as the surface expression of the deep-seated suture zone between the colliding Africa and Europe continental crusts.

The following notes are devoted to a small series of Crustacea, not directly related to one another, but which have been awaiting a favourable moment for description.

3D seismic data and wireline logs from 17 wells in the onshore East Nile Delta were utilized to study the stratigraphic architecture and evolution of Oligocene deposits. The Oligocene is readily recognized on seismic cross-sections by a series of northward prograding clinoforms. The Oligocene sequences show lateral facies changes from fluvial to deepwater via a shelf-edge delta. Such deltaic features include distributary channels, interdistributary bay fill, and a delta plain and front, gradually changing downslope into prodelta and slope deposits. The slope deposits include three main depositional elements: a deeply incised channel, a complex of laterally switched leveed channels and lobes, and crevasses and frontal splays. These depositional elements are formed in the main western slope basin and local eastern intraslope ponded sub-basin. The reactivated E–W- and NW-trending faults as well as NE–SW inverted structures are the main controls on slope physiography that formed the main corridors for Oligocene sediment distribution. Two main globally correlated Oligocene sequences are encountered being separated by the major drop in global eustatic sea level at 28.1Ma. The lower Oligocene sequence has two main stages: (1) the formation and filling of a basal canyon; and (2) the formation and progradation of shelf deltas to form shelf-edge deltas, and then progradation with an ascending shelf-edge trajectory (clinoforms 1). The upper Oligocene sequence is characterized by accretionary shelf-edge deltas with descending and then flat trajectories (clinoforms 2–4). The frontal splay and lobe complex exhibits potentially favourable reservoir continuity and areal coverage followed by the slope channels.

The author has been engaged during occasional visits to the Vale of Eden in the study of the well-known Brockram conglomerates which form so conspicuous an element in the Poikilitic series of the district. Tentative results obtained five or six years ago have been fully confirmed by later observations, and though the investigation is not quite complete, the author regards the present occasion as an opportune one for presenting a preliminary statement of views which have already obtained some currency by annual demonstrations in the field to scientific societies of the North of England.

Zircons from a bentonite near the base of the Purley Shale Formation in the Nuneaton area, Warwickshire, yield a 206Pb/238U age of 517.22 ± 0.31 Ma. Based on the fauna of small shelly fossils and the brachiopod Micromitra phillipsii in the underlying Home Farm Member of the Hartshill Sandstone Formation, trilobite fragments that are questionably referred to Callavia from the basal Purley Shale Formation, and the presence of trilobites diagnostic of the sabulosa Biozone 66 m above the base of the Purley Shale Formation, the bentonite likely dates an horizon within Cambrian Stage 3, at about the level of the Fallotaspis or basal Callavia Biozone. This is consistent with bentonite ages from other localities in southern Britain, which constrain the age of the lower and uppermost parts of Cambrian Stage 3. The new date provides additional chronological control on the earliest occurrence of trilobites in the Midland Microcraton, a date for the marine transgression at the base of the Purley Shale Formation, and is the first radiometric age from the Cambrian succession of Warwickshire.

The recognition of fossiliferous horizons both below and above the classical Ediacara levels of the Flinders Ranges, South Australia, significantly expands the potential of this candidate World Heritage succession. Here we document a small window into the biology and taphonomy of the late Ediacaran seafloor within the new Nilpena Sandstone Member of the Rawnsley Quartzite in Bathtub Gorge, northern Heysen Range. A 1 m2 slab extracted from the gorge, now on permanent display at the South Australian Museum, has a death assemblage dominated by the erniettomorph Phyllozoon hanseni Jenkins and Gehling 1978 and a newly named macroscopic tubular body fossil – Aulozoon soliorum gen. et sp. nov. – on its fine sandstone bed sole. The orientations and juxtaposition of these taxa suggest overprinting of an in situ benthic Phyllozoon community by sand-filled tubes of Aulozoon carried in by a storm wave-base surge. Phyllozoon hanseni is a widespread species that is restricted to the Nilpena Sandstone Member of the Rawnsley Quartzite, whereas Dickinsonia costata ranges from the underlying Ediacara Sandstone Member into the Nilpena Sandstone Member. Fundamental differences in the ways these two vendobiont taxa are constructed and preserved may provide insights into their biology and phylogenetic affinities. In the Nilpena Sandstone Member, D. costata is joined by Dickinsonia rex Jenkins 1992, which appears to be confined to the member, and is here re-described to clarify its taxonomic status and stratigraphic distribution.

The Amdeh Formation is a 3.4 km stack of sparsely fossiliferous quartzites and shales which crops out in the Al Hajar mountains near Muscat. Here we describe the uppermost member (Am5) that can be dated biostratigraphically as Darriwilian and which is the outcrop equivalent, and probably the seaward continuation, of the Saih Nihayda Formation in the Ghaba Salt Basin of northern Oman. The outcrops at Wadi Daiqa and Hayl al Quwasim consist of 690 m of quartzitic sandstones, shales and bivalve-rich shell beds. Trace fossils referable to the Cruziana and Skolithos ichnofacies abound. The member comprises storm-dominated shelf, shoreface and delta deposits. A number of new discoveries have been made in the outcrops: fragments of the arandaspid fish Sacabambaspis, ossicles and moulds of the early disparid crinoid Iocrinus, two new genera of conodont, an occurrence of the rare trinucleid trilobite Yinpanolithus, and palynological and sedimentological evidence of more continuous Floian–Darriwilian deposition than is usual in the region. Sea levels during Middle Ordovician time are estimated to have been 50–200 m above present levels and a wide, low-gradient shelf covered much of Arabia. Similar trace fossils and storm-dominated, micro-tidal, sedimentary rocks occur throughout the region. Small changes of sea level, possibly caused by the growth and melting of polar ice sheets, could lead to substantial seaward or landward shifts of facies belts. The Am5 deposits are thick compared to most equivalents in Arabia implying active subsidence and a ready supply of sediment.

A collection of basaltic rocks has been dredged from part of the Blackstones igneous centre, a major offshore intrusion situated about 50 km SW of Mull. The basalts are mainly olivine tholeiites and are closely similar to transitional basalts found on the Inner Hebrides. The mean of four concordant K—Ar dates obtained from the lavas indicates an age of 57.1 (± 0.9) Ma. The Blackstones complex thus appears to be coeval with other Tertiary centres of the area.

A graptolite fauna, found in cherty shales interbedded with volcanic rocks south of Charlestown, Co. Mayo, indicates an Arenig age.

The precise age of the Millstone Grit of South Wales has been in doubt for some years. Although it has been shown to be of Upper Carboniferous age, it has been uncertain whether the whole of the earliest part of the Upper Carboniferous is represented by deposits in southern Britain. Some part of the Millstone Grit of Pembrokeshire has been regarded, on the basis of its flora, as of Middle Coal Measure or Yorkian age (Goode, 1913, p. 272). Similar conclusions have been reached by Dr. R. Crookall concerning part of the Millstone Grit of Somerset (1925, p. 403). As yet, the flora characteristic of the Lanarkian of northern Britain has not been proved to be present in South Wales and elsewhere in south Britain. On the other hand, it has been argued that the absence of a Lanarkian flora does not necessarily imply an important break in the sequence, since recent work on the lamellibranch fauna of various British coalfields points to the conclusion that the lowest part of the Lower Coal Series of South Wales is of approximately the same age as the Lower Coal Measures of northern England (Davies and Trueman, 1927, p. 253).

Underground borings through the Lower and Middle Coal Measures beneath the Firth of Forth have proved sequences of rhythmically bedded volcanic detritus and a thin basalt lava. The detritus is believed to have been derived from a contemporaneous cinder cone or cones previously located by an off-shore boring. The new evidence suggests that locally there was an eastward shift of focus of eruption during Coal Measure times. The relationship of volcanism to this type of rhythmic sedimentation is discussed.