CHAPTER XVI. 



TRIAS, OR NEW RED SANDSTONE GROUP. 



New Red Sandstone; Triasic, or Saliferous, or Poikilitic* System of English 

 Authors. 



1. Red, or Variegated Marls of English ; Marnes Irisees and Calcaire Con- 

 chylien of French ; and Keuper and Muschelkalk of German Authors. 



2. New Red and Variegated Sandstone of English; Gres Bigarre of French; 

 and Bunter Sandsteiu of German Authors. f 1 



3. Magnesian Limestone of English ; Zechstein of Germans. 



4. Lower New Red Sandstone of English ; Gres des Vosges of French ; 

 Rothtodt-Jiegendes of Germans. "J* 



The entire formation is also styled " Trias " in Germany, because it there 

 consists of three principal portions; first, the Variegated Marls; secondly, 

 the Muschelkalk; and, thirdly, the Variegated Sandstone. The Mus- 

 chelkalk, though extensively developed in Germany, is wanting through- 

 out the whole of France, with the exception of the environs of the 

 Vosges Mountains, while in England it is absent altogether. 



MUSEUMS : Geological Society, that of Warwick, and other local Collections 



AUTHORS: Murchison, Lyell, Sedgwick, Jaeger, Voltz, Elie de Beaumont, &c. 



CHARACTERISTICS: A Marine formation, comparatively poor in Fossils; 



remarkable for the traces of Footsteps of Animals, and for its Springs of 



Brine and Stores of Rock-Sal t, hence called the Saliferous, and also, from 



the diversified Tints of the Strata, the Poikilitic or Variegated Group. 



BENEATH the lias occurs, in the midland and western counties 

 of England, a vast series of red marls and sandstones, which 



* From TTOIK(\OS, varied or mottled, from the appearance of these deposits. 



f Of the German names above cited, the derivation of Keuper, which is 

 supposed to be a miner's term, is wholly unknown. Muschelkalk is employed 

 to designate a limestone containing My till. Bunter Sandstein, or variegated 

 sandstone, is sufficiently clear. Zechstein, again, is obscure, but its derivation 

 is referred by Adelung to the signification of zech, which means a company or 

 association, who were accustomed to hire a pit or a quarry, for the purpose of 

 working it, in this instance probably for copper. Rothtodt-liegendes, literally, 

 red-dead-lier, is used to indicate that the copper found in the upper beds has 

 died out, and is not met with in these underlying deposits. 



