ESTIIERIA MINUTA. 



49 



Kenper 



Bimter 



(e- 



Musclielkalk... 



i Yellow, hard sandstone, with Bone-bed. Modiola minuta, Avicula ffracilis, 

 and Myacites. Patches of coal. 

 Red clays. 



(1, /White sandstone, alternated with bright-coloured and blue clays ; coal- 



I patches; silcx and agate. Reptilian bones. 



c Variegated marl and sandstone, with foot-tracks and ripple-marks. Shells 



rai-e. 



b Green and reddish sandstone. Plants. 



a Gypsum and marls. Shells. Reptiles. Ceratodus. 



Dolomitic limestones. Estheria minuta, Lingula tenuissima, Trigonia 



Goldfiissii, GervilUa socialis. Fishes. 

 Marl and clay. Mastodontosaurus. 

 Grey sandstone, with Equisetites 



Grey sandstone, with Bone-bed. Coprolites, Gryolepis tenui-striatus, 

 Acrodiis Gaillardoti, Psammodus, Hyhodus plicatilis, Dracosaurns 

 Bronnii. 

 Dolomite, and limestone. Pemphyx Sueurii, Fucus Hehlii. 

 Thin marly limestones. Saurian and Fish-remains, Ceratites nodosus, 



Encrinites lUiiformis, and abundance of marine shells. 

 Limestones. 

 ( Limestone. 



d. Lettenkohle 



c. Muschelkalk 

 proper 



b. Salt-group { Clays with gypsum and rock-salt. 



Va. Wellenkalk 



J h. Red sandstones. 

 [a. Sandstone. 



[Limestone, 

 f Wellenkalk 

 I Wellendolomit 



} 



Marine shells, &c. 



Quenstedt thus refers to Est/ieria ininuta an i Lingula tenuissima of the Keuper, in his 'Flbzgebirge 

 Wiirtembergs,' pp. 71 and 75. "Above the Lettenkohle (he says) is an extremely hard dolomite, 

 several feet thick, lying between thin dolomitic beds, darkish [in colour, and streaked with yellow. 

 Careful search in the thin dolomites overlying the hard variegated dolomite, may be made with 

 interest, for at every splitting of the beds the little Posidonia minuta scales off in thousands ; and in some 

 specimens a thin-shelled Lingula occurs, which in this association, although without any very striking 

 characteristic of its own, becomes the strongest boundary-mark for the Muschelkalk formation. This fine- 

 striped Lingula, called tenuissima, on account of the thinness of its shell, is distinguished only by its place 

 of occurrence from the Lingulce of other formations. It lies always above the sandstone and variegated 

 dolomite (Flammendolomit), and scattered among the Posidonice. P. minuta is seldom many lines in 

 diameter, it has an obliquely oval shell with a straight hinge, and is only on account of its concentric 

 wrinkles recognised as a Posidonia. The specimens might be taken for badly preserved Astartes, or many 

 other shells ; so little is known of its generic characters." 



Again, in his 'Handbuch der Petrefaktenkunde,' Tubingen, 1852, p. 516, Quenstedt says — " Posido- 

 noniya minuta (pi. 42, fig. 13 ; 'Zieten. Verst.,' pi. 54, fig. 5) lies in millions in the dolomitic beds above 

 the Lettenkohle. This little longish shell may as well belong to an Astarte, or any other bivalve. From 

 the impressions this cannot be decided." 



1851. From H. G. Bronn's third edition of his 'Lethsea Geognostica,' 1851, vol. ii, 



7 



