MEMOIRS 



OF THE 



GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF INDIA, 



Description of the Geology of NispuR and its neighlourhood, ly William 

 T. Blanfoed, f. g. S., Beputy Superintendent, Geological Survey of 

 India. 



The neighbourhood of Nagpiir has beeomOj through the writings of 

 Voysey-j Malcolmson and Hislop^ and especially of the latter^ one of the 

 best known geological areas in the Indian peninsula. Its position 

 precisely on the edge of the two great series of formations^ the trappean 

 and metamorphic, which, between thenij occupy by far the larger por- 

 tion of the Indian peninsula, gives to the locality a peculiar geological 

 interest, which is greatly increased by the existence in its neighbourhood 

 of several groups of sedimentary strata, and the occurrence of fossils in 

 considerable abundance. 



Until the season 1866-67, although the Geological Survey had been 

 extended to within a comparatively short distance of Nagptir, both on the 

 north and the west, it had been impracticable to examine the very interest- 

 ing formations in the immediate neighbourhood of the city, and to corre- 

 late them with the rocks containing similar fossils in other parts of India. 

 It was especially desirable that this should be done in the case of the 

 sandstone of Silewada and Kamthi, because the fossils found in them by 

 Malcolmson and Hislop were known to be similar to those occurring in 

 the beds associated with coal in Bengal and the Narbada valley. The 

 practical results of the examination, so far as the probability of finding 

 coal near Nagpur is concerned, were published in the Records of the 



( 2:95 ) 

 Memoirs, Geological Survej of India, Vol, IX, Art. 2 



