34 CROSS 



distinctly local deposits as may now be preserved it is proposed to 

 provide a group name. 



As the beds in question are genetically connected with the uplift 

 which gave rise to the Rocky Mountains and have a wide range 

 through the mountain province it would be most appropriate if the 

 group name could refer to these relations. But the use of Rocky 

 Mountain as the name of a Carboniferous quartzite, by Dowling," 

 precludes the application of this term in another sense. The State 

 names Montana, Wyoming and Colorado, and all the other geographic 

 names of more than local significance which might be considered 

 appropriate for this purpose appear to be already in use as strati- 

 graphic terms. Believing that it would be a misfortune to adopt a 

 purely local term for this great group of deposits, I have followed 

 the personal suggestion of Dr. F. H. Knowlton and selected an Indian 

 name connected with the larger part of the Rocky Mountain prov- 

 ince. The map published by the Bureau of Ethnology illustrating 

 the distribution of the great linguistic families of North American 

 Indians shows the district once occupied by the Shoshonean family 

 to embrace the greater part of the Rocky Mountain area, with 

 a part of the great Basin. The mountains were especially the 

 land of the Utes and Shoshones, two tribes of this family. With 

 this broad derivation it is proposed to apply the term Shoshone 

 Group to the deposits which unconformably succeed the Laramie 

 and to their equivalents, and which are overlain by the Fort Union 

 or Wasatch beds, when they are present. 



It is to be clearly understood that the name Shoshone refers to no 

 typical locality or district but rather to a province. It has no con- 

 nection with the Pliocene Shoshone Lake of King, the deposits of 

 which he called the Humboldt Group. In manner of derivation the 

 term is directly comparable with "Algonkian," which comes from 

 Algonquian, the name of another linguistic family of Indians, and 

 of the province they inhabited. 



Laramie and Shoshone beds may be easily separated, under the 

 broad general definitions thus far used, where angular imconform- 

 ity exists between them or where a corresponding stratigraphic 

 break can be identified by lithologic or palcontologic evidence. One 



'^ Dowling, D. B. : Report on the Cascade Coal Basin, Alberta, Canada 

 Geological Survey, 1907, p. 9. 



