COMPARATIVE SKETCH OF THE PRECAAIURIC 

 GEOLOGY OF SWEDEN AND NEW YORK 



BY J. F. KEMP 



The eleventh International Geological Congress, which was held 

 in Stockholm, August 17 to 25, 19 10, afforded visitors from else- 

 where exceptional opportunities to become familiar with the 

 Scandinavian Precambric exposures and problems. One excursion 

 of three weeks' duration, before the sessions of the Congress, was 

 planned for northern Sweden ; while a second covering ten days 

 was devoted to southern Sweden. Besides these two, and both 

 before and after the sessions, two others were tendered the visitors 

 specially interested in the iron ore deposits. The mining trip before 

 the Congress in part coincided with the one planned for the Archean 

 geologists but the tw^o that came afterward were essentially differ- 

 ent. Since in each group was a member of the New York State 

 Survey, Mr Newland accompanying the mining sections and the 

 writer the Archean, it has been thought by these two observers that 

 a sketch of the geology of the Swedish magnetites as compared 

 with those in New York, and an outline of the Swedish Precambric 

 as compared with the home exposures would present elements of 

 interest. The latter sketch may be best given first since all the 

 iron ores are in the very ancient strata. 



A few figures of relative areas will be of interest in establishing 

 a point of view. New York contains 49,170 square miles, of which 

 1550, or about 3 per cent, are lakes. Sweden covers 172,876 square 

 miles or approximately three and one-half times as much as New 

 York; one-twelfth of its area consists of lakes. Norway has 

 124,445 square miles, so that Scandinavia proper is nearly six times 

 as great as the Empire State. Were we to take together with New 

 York the New England States, Pennsylvania and Maryland, the 

 total would be very nearly that of Sweden. Sweden, however, is 

 so much narrower that if we lay it off from the northern point of 

 Maine, it would reach a little beyond the extreme southern point 

 of North Carolina. In population of the date 1900, Sweden had 

 5,136,000, and Norway, 2,240,000. The total of the two was a little 

 more than New York's 7,268,894. In 1910 New York had grown to 

 9,113,279, but the two Scandinavian countries have probably not 



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