AYMESTRY OR LUDLOW LIMESTONE. 



203 



the beds dipping to the south-east and west-south- west at angles varying from ten to twenty-five 

 degrees. The Pentamerus Knightii does not occur here, but the prevalent associated fossils, such 

 as Lingula Lewisii, Terebratula Wilsoni, and others, are abundant. In Norton Camp, the lime- 

 stone occupies a bold scar on the left bank of the Onny, the crest of which is about seven hundred 

 feet above the river, in which position it forms an escarpment capping the lower Ludlow Rock ; 

 whence dipping to the south-east at an angle of 12°, it passes beneath the upper Ludlow Rock near 

 Onnibury. The Pentamerus Knightii, though of rare occurrence to the north of the Onny, has 

 been detected in the limestone of Norton Camp, associated with a few crinoidal stems, the Productus 

 lineatus, &c. 



In the View Edge, the cliff on the south bank of the Onny and opposite to Norton Camp, the 

 limestone on the contrary is loaded with Pentameri, the shells packed closely together in a mass of 

 limestone from nine to ten feet thick. Throughout its range, extending from this picturesque cliff 

 to Aymestry, a devious and broken course of twelve or fourteen miles, the rock is everywhere 

 characterized by the presence of the same beautiful fossil. Instructive sections are displayed 

 at Goat's Hill, Shelderton, and Mocktree Hays, where masses of limestone, varying in thickness 

 from fifteen to fifty feet, are uniformly [capped by the terebratulite stratum, and repose upon 

 the argillaceous beds of the lower Ludlow Rock. The new road from Ludlow to Leintwardine, 

 traversing this escarpment, lays open a fine example of the limestone, which is there much worked, 

 and has afforded the largest specimens of the Pentamerus Knightii yet found. In the gorge of the 

 Teme at Downton on the Rock, the limestone is still better displayed in a vertical cliff, the beds of 

 which dip at an angle of about tweuty-five degrees to the north. The calcareous mass at this spot 

 has a thickness of at least fifty feet 1 . The limestone can be further traced all round the inner edge 

 of the great promontory of Ludlow. In Brindgwood Chase and Whitcliffe, it is only a thin band, 

 which, turning round by St. Mary's Knoll, reappears in Sunny Hill Bank, and on the slope on 

 Hanway Common, at the Bone Well, and at Palmer's Cairn. On the south-eastern face of this 

 promontory it is thrown up into a double ridge, the inner one extending from the High Vinnall to 

 Gatley Coppice, the outer continuous from the Palmer's Cairn to the Whiteway Head, and Croft 

 Ambrey, and thence to the gorge at Aymestry by which the Lugg escapes into the plains of Here- 

 fordshire. At Aymestry it occupies both banks of that river, but it is chiefly quarried on the right 

 bank and close to the village. The zone of limestone is not traceable for more than one mile to the 

 south-west of Aymestry, where it thins into a narrow band and disappears beneath the mass of 

 upper Ludlow Rock in the Hills of Shobden. 



In their range over other and distant districts, the strata occupying the centre of the 

 Ludlow formation are seldom sufficiently calcareous to be burnt for lime, and with the 

 disappearance of the lime we lose the presence of the Pentamerus Knightii. The place, 

 however, of this band is often clearly marked by the constant occurrence of the other 

 associated fossils, particularly the Terebratula Nucula, the Terebratula Wilsoni, the 

 Lingula Lewisii, &c. At Sedgeley in Staffordshire, however, where the rock again 

 appears in a highly calcareous form, it will be shown to contain the Pentamerus Knightii 

 of this western region. 



> Large and massive blocks have been extracted by Mr. T. A. Knight, of Downton Castle, some of which 

 have been polished as marble. 



