Revieivs — The Palceozoic TilUtes of Northern Norivay. 378 



Formation of Norway, suggested that they were of Torridonian or 

 Lower Cambrian age. A Quaternary age was subsequently 

 advocated by 0. E. Schiotz, but Sir A. Strahan supported 

 Dr. Eeusch's interpretation. Whilst the deposits certainly belong to 

 the Palaeozoic, there was very little evidence for regarding them as 

 Cambrian, yet this was widely accej)ted, and the Varangerfjord beds 

 are commonly correlated with similar deposits of Cambrian age in 

 China and Australia, and cited to support the hypothesis of a 

 Cambrian ice age. As a result of detailed work in the northernmost 

 part of Norway, Dr. 0. Holtedahl places a new interpretation upon 

 the age and significance of the tillites. 



The succession in Finmarken is made out as follows : — 



(Upper with tillites. 

 Sandstone Series \ Lower with dolomites, and, in the west, volcanic 

 [ rocks. 

 Loiver Cambrian shales with PlatijRoJenites antiqicissinnts and 

 Obolus sp. 



Pke-Cambrian. 



The pre-Cambrian gneisses and schists occupy the southern part 

 of the area — the later sedimentaries occurring to the north, and 

 being themselves covered in the north-west by an overthrust meta- 

 morphic series dating from the Caledonian movements. The 

 discovery in Spitsbergen of Downtonian sediments lying uncon- 

 formably uj)on the eroded remnants of the Caledonian Range prove 

 that in this region this great deformation was completed before 

 Upper Silurian times, and therefore the tillites can be referred to 

 some period between the Lower Cambrian and Upper Silurian. The 

 Sandstone Series has not yet yielded any fossils, and its more 

 definite age has to be inferred from a comparison v»'ith the rocks 

 of neighbouring regions. 



The Lower Sandstone Series follows conformably upon the Lower 

 Cambrian and is notable for its thick beds of magnesian lime- 

 stone, commonly entirely composed of dolomite — intraformational 

 conglomerates occur. These dolomites are often oolitic, and 

 contain chert nodules and abundant stromatolitic forms, and they 

 are correlated with the Durness Limestone and similar North 

 American beds of Upper Cambrian and Lower Ordovician age. The 

 land barrier sejoarating the northern part of Great Britain with its 

 North American fauna from the southern, seems to have extended 

 north-east to South Finmarken, where it separated the northern 

 sea of the Arctic Province with its characteristic dolomites from 

 the southern in which the Kristiania beds of normal South British 

 type were deposited. The volcanic rocks of West Finmarken are 

 paralleled with the Lower Ordovician lavas of Central Norway and 

 South Scotland. 



The Lower Series was folded and faulted before the deposition of 

 the Upper, which lies unconformably upon both the pre-Cambrian 

 and the Lower Sandstones. The Varangerfjord fault runs east to 



