212 MIOCENE STRATA OF FRANCE. [Ch. XIY. 



CHAPTER XIV. 



MIOCENE PERIOD. 



Upper Miocene strata of France — Faluns of Touraine — Depth of sea and littoral 

 character of fauna — Tropical climate implied by the testacea — Proportion of 

 recent species of shells — Faluns more ancient than the Suffolk Crag — Varieties 

 of Yoluta Lamberti peculiar to Faluns and to Suffolk Crag — The same spe- 

 cies are common to more than one geological Period — Lower Miocene strata 

 of France — Remarks on classification, and where to draw the line of separation 

 between Miocene and Eocene strata — Relations of the Gres de Fontainebleau to 

 the Faluns and to the Calcaire Grossier — Lower Miocene strata of Central 

 France — Lacustrine strata of Auvergne — Indusial limestone — Fossil mammalia 

 of the Limagne d' Auvergne — Freshwater strata of the Cantal — Its resemblance 

 in some places to white chalk with flints — Proofs of gradual deposition — Miocene 

 strata of Bordeaux and South of France — Upper Miocene strata of Gers — 

 Dryopithecus — Belgian and British Miocene formations — Edeghem beds near 

 Antwerp — Diest sands of Belgium and contemporaneous iron-sands of North 

 Downs — Upper Miocene beds of Belgium — Bolderberg — Lower Miocene strata 

 of Kleyn Spawen — Hempstead beds, Isle of Wight — Bovey Tracey Lignites 

 in Devonshire — Isle of Mull Leaf-beds — Miocene formations of Germany — 

 Mayence basin — Upper Miocene beds of Vienna basin — Lower Miocene of 

 Croatia — Fossil Lepidoptera — Oligocene strata of Professor Beyrich — Miocene 

 strata of Italy. 



MIOCENE STRATA OF FRANCE. UPPER MIOCENE FALUNS OF 



TOURAINE. MIOCENE FORMATIONS. 



The strata which we meet with next in the descending order are 

 those called by many geologists "Middle Tertiary," for which in 1833 

 I proposed the name of Miocene, selecting the " falnns " of the valley 

 of the Loire in France as my example or type. 



I shall now call these Falunian deposits Upper Miocene, to distin- 

 guish them from others to which the name of Lower Miocene will he 

 given. The latter were classed by me in former editions of this work 

 as Upper Eocene, and the reasons which have induced me to alter this 

 classification will be fully explained to the reader in this and the fol- 

 lowing chapter. The term " faluns " is given provincially by French 

 agriculturists to shelly sand and marl spread over the land in Touraine, 

 just as the " crag " was formerly much used to fertilise the soil in Suffolk. 

 Isolated masses of such faluns occur from near the mouth of the Loire, in 

 the neighborhood of Nantes, to as far inland as a district south of Tours. 

 They are also found at Pontlevoy, on the Cher, about 70 miles above the 

 junction of that river with the Loire, and 30 miles S.E. of Tours. De- 

 posits of the same age also appear under new mineral conditions near the 



