RECENT STUDIES ON THE GEOLOGY OF THE 



FAEROES 



Joannes Rasmussen 

 Museum of Natural History, Torshavn, Faeroes 



Apart from papers written during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries on 

 Faeroese minerals and coal measures, the geology of the Faeroe Islands is not 

 mentioned in the literature until about 1800. 



Without going into tiring, historical details, I shall very briefly list the most 

 important works on the geology of the Faeroes in the nineteenth century, 

 namely the papers by Sir George Mackenzie and Th. Allan in 1814, by 

 J. G. Forchhammer and W. C. Trevelyan in 1823-24, and by A. Helland and 

 J. Geikie in 1880. 



Sir George Mackenzie, together with Thomas Allan, paid a visit to the 

 Faeroe Islands in 1812. The purpose of their journey was to ascertain whether 

 special geological features observed in Iceland, where Sir George Mackenzie 

 had visited in 1810, were to be found also in the Faeroes. In his work, 

 Mackenzie describes some geological observations and concludes that the 

 islands are of submarine volcanic origin. Allan shares Mackenzie's view of the 

 volcanic origin, but does not agree with his opinion regarding the submarine 

 eruptions. Allan's observations of striae and his words concerning them are of 

 interest: "The rock appears to have been worn down by the friction of heavy 

 bodies." 



Eleven years later, in 1821, Forchhammer visited the Faeroe Islands 

 together with Trevelyan, the British mineralogist and botanist. In Forch- 

 hammer's paper (1824) we find the first complete account of the geology of the 

 Faeroe Islands. Forchhammer divides the rocks into 4 groups: (1) Trap 

 without glassy feldspar, (2) Coal measures, (3) Porphyritic rocks, and (4) 

 Irregular trap (dykes and sills). He shows the regional extension of these 

 rock types on an accompanying small map. 



During the next 58 years we find only a few fragmentary works on the 

 geology of the Faeroe Islands, but in 1879 Helland and Geikie visited the 

 Faeroe Islands. The particular purpose of the journey was to examine 

 the glacial geology of the islands, which hitherto was as good as unknown. 

 Basing their statements on the radiating direction of the striae and the total 

 absence of foreign rocks, Helland (1880) and Geikie (1880) concluded that 

 the Faeroes have had a glaciation of their own. In Helland's as well as in 



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