2 PROCEEDINGS OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. [May 3, 



Roth-liegende was the base, and in which the Zechstein was covered 

 conformably by another red sandstone which had previously been erro- 

 neously united with the Trias. My colleagues, De Verneuil and Key- 

 serling, having cooperated with me in establishing the independence 

 of this group as developed upon so large a scale in the eastern regions 

 (Permia) of European Russia, in showing that by its fauna and flora 

 it must be viewed as the uppermost of the palaeozoic systems, it was 

 indeed evident that some single name must be applied to it, and hence 

 Permian was adhered to, the word being derived from a vast region 

 (twice as large as France) where the strata of this age are copiously 

 exhibited. No other general term had been applied to the group in 

 question; for although my excellent friend M. d'Omalius d'Halloy 

 had used the term Peneen, that word having been applied by him to 

 characterize a ** sterile " conglomerate only which overlies the coal- 

 measures of Belgium, it was evident from its very import that the 

 name could not be extended to a compound group of sandstone, lime- 

 stone, schists and conglomerates, which instead of being sterile was 

 clearly characterized by its organic contents. It is in this compre- 

 hensive sense that I have employed the word Permian in the small 

 Geological Map of England and Wales published by the Society for 

 the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. The country of all others, how- 

 ever, in which the new term seemed least likely to be received was 

 Germany, where my eminent contemporary, Leopold von Buch, was 

 most anxious that the group should be named from the Zechstein so 

 long known, and whose fossils had mainly contributed to prove the 

 character of the system. Feeling the force of this appeal, I endea- 

 voured, in deference to my friend, to alter the name Permian which 

 had been announced ; but finding it to be impracticable to elicit from 

 '* Zechstein" a term which could have passed current in the French, 

 English and Italian languages, the euphonious synonym Permian was 

 continued. I need not remind English geologists of the desirableness 

 of having some general name for their "lower new red sandstone" 

 and "magnesian limestone ;" and as I now find that a distinguished 

 German professor, whose geological maps are an honour to our age, 

 has spontaneously come to the same conclusion for his own country, 

 I have the best hopes that the Permian System will henceforward be 

 recognized as founded on researches which proved it to be the upper- 

 most member of the palaeozoic series over an area of enormous mag- 

 nitude. 



The following is the letter of Professor Naumann : — 



Roderick I. Murchison. 



Rome, February 19, 1848. 



"Leipsic, January 6, 1848. 



" I hasten to inform you that the sandstones and schistose clays 

 of the environs of Oschatz, which are so loaded with impressions 

 of Lycopodites or Walchia, and which at first I considered to be of 

 the carboniferous age, develope more and more the characters of your 

 Permian formation. The discovery of the Calamites gig as and of a 

 fern closely allied to Sphenopteris erosa, together with the difference 



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