1 92 1. No. 1 1. 



THE STRANDFLAT AND ISOSTASY. 



Fig. 136. The Saddle Mountain, with the strandflat on both sides, on the southqfn end of 

 Prince Charles Foreland, seen from Foreland Sound on July i6th, 1912. [From Nansen 1920]. 



Relation between the Development of the Strandflat and the 

 Geological Structure of the Land. 



The strandflat of Spitsbergen is to a great extent cut ni rocks with 

 relatively little power of resistance to the frost erosion. It has therefore 

 easily been levelled to a fairly regular plane in most places, rising gently 

 inland from the shore. Where, however, the rock is more resistant, the 

 strandflat is much narrower, or is poorly developed, with a more uneven 

 surface. This is. for instance, the case in the region of the north-west 

 corner of Spitsbergen, where there are gneiss-granites and granites (see 

 Fig. 145). The strandflat is here poorly developed, and its surface is un- 

 even like that of the Norwegian strandflat cut in resistant rocks. 



On the east side of Wijde Bay the land is built up of gneiss-granites, 

 and in its northern parts of mica-schists and other crystalline schists. 

 There the strandflat is well developed, with a flatter, more regular sur- 

 face, obviously because the rocks are less resistant. 



A comparison between the geological map Fig. 135 and the map 

 Fig. 133 and 134 may give some idea of the relation between the distri- 

 bution of the strandflat and the geological structure of the land. 



Prince Charles Foreland. 



The emerged strandflat is well developed on Prince Charles Fore- 

 land, and it is a noteworthy fact that in the northern part of the island 

 it is wider along the relatively sheltered east coast than along the west 

 coast exposed to the violent wave action of the open ocean, and where 

 we might expect to find it especially well developed. 



The explanation may to some extent be that the strandflat has chiefly 

 been finally planed by the shore erosion by frost after the land had been 

 much denuded especially by the local glacial cirque erosion, while the main 

 importance of the wave action has been to carry away the débris formed 

 by the sliore erosion. For this purpose there has been sufficient wave 

 action in the Foreland Sound, now 10 to 20 kilometres broad, and 



