Fragments of coal found in contexts of the third century A.D. at the legionary fortress of Caerleon (Isca) are assigned from intrinsic evidence to a local source. A brief comment on the use of coal in Roman Britain follows.

The rifting of the Red Sea, the folding of the Zagros-Taurus range (in Turkey and Iran), and the development of the structures in and near Israel appear to have resulted from a northward anti-clockwise rotational movement of Arabia, which occurred in several phases during Upper Cretaceous to Pleistocene times. The sinistral strike slip fault of the Dead Sea Fault system participated in this movement. It is hereby suggested that the fold and fault structures in Israel and adjacent areas are drag effects along this strike slip fault.

The succession of the Torridonian rocks seen on the islands of Fladday, Raasay, and Scalpay is described. Three lithological fades indicative of three distinct sedimentary environments are recognized. Breccias and grits, believed to be sub-aerial in their lower part, are overlain, or pass laterally into, grey shales and sandstones of lacustrine or shallow water marine origin. These are succeeded by red fluviatile sandstones and shales, which, except near the base, are coarse grained and pebbly throughout much of the succession. Three cases of lateral facies variation are described and their significance discussed with regard to the Torridonian succession elsewhere in the Inner Hebrides and on the mainland.

Accretionary lapilli have been described from rocks of all geological ages as well as from historical eruptions and in all cases they are associated with volcanic activity in which large amounts of steam accompany the eruption of dense clouds of ash material. Similar lapilli are described from deposits thought to have been deposited near to the flank of a well-established geosynclinal trough of the Precambrian Barama-Mazaruni Assemblage of British Guiana.

Magmatic differentiation is demonstrated in two epidiorite sills from the Grampian Highlands of Scotland, and the distribution of major and minor elements compared with data given for other intrusions, and for trace elements in the Whin Sill at High Cup Gill, Westmorland. The latter sill has Sr and Ba enriched towards the top. The element distribution for the epidiorite sills indicates that they are overturned. The data are conclusive for one sill but merely suggestive for the other, since such phenomena as multiple injection may also have affected the element distribution. The structural significance is briefly discussed.

Conjugate folds are recorded in Moine rocks some 15 miles east of the Moine thrust zone and their association with lamproschists and regional joint systems is described. This, and other evidence, is used to establish a sequence of late Orogenic events for the interior of the Moine nappe. A correlation with events in the thrust zone is suggested. It is concluded that the Moine thrust movements took place in Lower Old Red Sandstone times and that this coincided with a period of rapid isostatic uplift of the axial region of the Caledonian orogen.

It has been suggested that the ultrabasic and basic gneiss masses in the Lewisian near Scourie and Drumbeg are layered igneous bodies possibly containing primary igneous mineral assemblages. This hypothesis is reviewed in all its aspects and rejected on the grounds of field relationships, mineralogy, and geochemistry.

Two isolated thecal plates of a Comarocystitid paracrinoid are described from the Starfish Bed, Girvan. The discovery extends the stratigraphic and geographical range of the family Comarocystitidae and class Paracrinoidea.

A conglomerate band exposed in Gullet Quarry, at the southern end of the Malvern Hills, contains a layer of shelly limestone in which are embedded large, often angular, boulders of Malyernian rock. The character of the limestone and the form and distribution of included boulders suggest that a near-shore environment of carbonate deposition was continually supplied with clastic material from adjacent sea-stacks. The limestone has yielded a conodont fauna indicative of a Llandovery age earlier than that assigned to the conglomerate by Reading and Poole (1961) on the basis of brachiopod evidence.

Chemical and mineralogical data are presented to demonstrate the overall similarity between granophyre and felsite from Rhum. However, although the compositions of the groundmasses of the two rock-types are very similar their characteristic textures are quite different. The felsitic texture is shown to be the result of devitrification of a glass, whilst the granophyric texture is attributed to the simultaneous crystallization of quartz and feldspar on the cotectic line in the system Ab–Or–SiO2–H2O. An explanation of the formation of the different textures is given in terms of the degree of super-cooling experienced by separate intrusions of the same magma in contrasted environments.

This note provides photographs of thin sections and cellulose peels prepared from the syntypes figured by Goldfuss (1826) of Cyathophyllum flexuosum Goldfuss, the type species by original designation of Campophyllum Edwards and Haime, 1850.

It is concluded that C. flexuosum is not a disphyllid, and that Campophyllum may be maintained as a genus distinct from Caninia, Caninophyllum, and Palaeosmilia. For the present it is placed alone in the family Campophyllidae Wedekind, 1932.

New potassium-argon age determinations are presented for rocks ranging in age from Lewisian to Tertiary. A late-Caledonian metamorphic event at about 422 million years is very important in the Highlands and the relationship of this to previous metamorphisms is discussed. Newer Granite emplacement took place about 400 million years ago and the Moine thrust movement also took place at about this date. Lower Carboniferous basalts yield, by whole rock methods, ages compatible with the time scales of Kulp (1960) and Holmes (1959). Volcanic activity in Mull is confirmed as Palaeocene or Eocene in age.

The determination of the stability conditions of chlorite, especially the stability temperature between 500° and 700° C. by B. W. Nelson, D. M. Roy, R. Roy, and H. S. Yoder complements the conclusions arrived at from the microscopical study of the interstitial chlorite in the diabase-minverite series of south-west England. These disprove the assumption that the chlorite generally originates from metasomatic reaction or devitrification of a glassy residue. Considering the formation of chlorite at a late stage of solidification, an explanation of its genesis is attempted on that basis. Possible effects on the petrologic evolution are discussed.

The chlorite taking part in the filling of amygdales and pseudoamygdales has formed preferentially by replacement of carbonates. Variation in form, degree, and associated products is exemplified. The appearance of a liquid carbonate phase, ascertained by P. J. Wyllie, O. F. Tuttle, and R. I. Harker in the system calcitewollastonite-water at temperatures between 640° and 680° C. seems to be realized likewise under natural conditions, and to provide a basis for the understanding of certain phenomena, especially in reaction zones.

A fenestrate bryozoan species recently collected from the Visean of County Fermanagh, Ireland, appears to correspond in all respects with Retepora nodulosa Phillips, from a similar horizon in Yorkshire. The last-named form was never satisfactorily defined or illustrated, the original type material is lost, and after being neglected for many years the name was declared a nomen dumium by Miller (1961). It is now recognized that, because of the presence of biserial carinal nodes, the species properly belongs in the genus Minilya, Crockford, 1944. It is here redescribed on the basis of a neotype from Fermanagh.

The positioning of the Siluro-Devonian boundary is reviewed in the light of recent studies in both shelly and graptolitic facies in Europe and elsewhere. A case can be made for retaining the present position at the base of the Ludlow Bone Bed; but international opinion may demand a new standard section in the graptolitic facies, for example in Central Europe. In this event, it is suggested that a position at the base of the Monograptus uniformis Zone might prove the most widely satisfactory solution.

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.

The lithological and faunal changes through the transition from non-marine Hangman Grits to marine Ilfracombe Beds of North Devon and West Somerset suggest the presence of a major depositional marine transgression. A fauna of thick-shelled lamellibranchs and gastropods occurs in beds lying stratigraphically between the flu-viatile Hangman deposits below, and the shallow-water marine Ilfracombe Beds above, and is considered to indicate an intermediate phase of intertidal depositional conditions. The transgression appears to have advanced across the region in a north-north-easterly direction during Lower-Middle Givetian times following coastal subsidence and possibly an associated rise of sea level.

The evidence presented for the supposed continuation of the Southern Uplands Fault in north-east Ireland is critically examined and found to be less convincing than recent statements imply.

Graphite was deposited in and around a diabase intruded along post-Borrowdale Volcanic, pre-Bala faults about 4,000 feet above the Skiddaw Slate–Borrowdale Volcanic boundary. Associated copper-lead-zinc mineralization follows faults of the same trend, and is isotopically dated at 470 million years (mid-Ordovician). The breakdown of carbon monoxide in the magmatic gases was promoted by substances (notably pyrite, iron oxides, iron silicates, and quartz) which catalysed the Boudouard reaction 2CO ⇌ CO2 + C. The PT conditions of deposition of the graphite and associated minerals are estimated at P ~ 1,000 bars, T ~ 120° to 600° C. Possible occurrences of natural interlamellar compounds of graphite are discussed.

Reconnaissance work carried out in north-east Southern Rhodesia has shown that the Umkondo System, previously known in the Mozambique Belt, extends into the Zambesi Belt. It is further demonstrated that the two belts were broadly continuous in structure and metamorphism during the important orogeny c. 500 m·y. The possibility that the mobile belts were active considerably earlier than 500 m·y. is discussed.