Chap. XIII.] 
PERMIAN OF THE KYFHAUSEE. 
319 
On proceeding from Stolberg and its old rocks on the south flank of the Harz, 
and reaching the town of Kelbra in the rich valley termed the Goldene Aue, the 
surface of the red-coloured arable fields is seen to be studded with fragments, 
often 2 or 3 feet long by 1 or 2 feet in diameter, of silicified stems of trees, 
which for the most part belong to the Plants termed Araucarites and Psaro- 
nites, the latter being unknown in any other deposit save the Roth-liegende of 
the Permian group. 
Standing on this red plain, the spectator has in face of him, to the south, a noble 
escarpment rising to upwards of a thousand feet high, the whole of which, 
ranging westwards from the ancient tower of the Kyf hauser by the Rotheberg, is 
composed of various strata of the Roth-liegende, whether of pebbly beds, sands, 
or shales, piled symmetrically on each other. In parts, as near the well-known 
and picturesque Hermitage on the Rotheberg, so much frequented by German 
summer tourists, the deposits have been broken through by eruptive rocks, 
chiefly syenitic greenstone ; but a little to the west of this disturbance all the 
strata are admirably exposed in the sides of the great highroad leading to 
Frankenhausen, which, by a series of traverses, mounts up to the summit of the 
hills. Now, whether, in making that ascent, we examine the base, as composed 
of finely laminated, earthy, deep-red sandstone, or the middle, of harder and more 
thickly bedded sandstones, or approach the summit, where light-coloured pebbly 
beds, used as millstones, are largely quarried (the latter being covered by other 
red marls and sandstones), we find throughout numerous fossil trees, regularly 
imbedded and lying either in horizontal positions or slightly oblique to the 
strata *. 
To the west and south-west, these noble masses of red conglomerate and sand- 
stone, followed by other red strata, are seen to be succeeded by the Zechstein, 
with huge associated bodies of gypsum, which in their turn are surmounted in 
the same hills by other red rocks. 
Here again, therefore, as everywhere in Northern Germany, the tripartite 
division is apparent, and the Zechstein (in this tract usually with masses of gyp- 
sum) is seen to be simply the central body of the great red Permian group. 
There are, however, many spots along the south flank of the Harz, and also 
to the south of the Kyf hauser promontory, where the gypsum is swollen out to 
masses of enormous dimensions, and is devoid of a regular capping of red sand, 
or indeed of any superjacent stratified deposit. In these cases it would seem 
that a former agency acting from beneath, along a great line of fissure, has 
greatly affected the rock, and changed the carbonates of lime into sulphates ; for 
there are some places where the bedding and colour of the layers are still evi- 
dent, and others, again, where the whole have been converted into amorphous 
and unstratified masses of huge dimensions. Not only do these masses of gyp- 
sum form lofty escarpments, usually blanched by atmospheric action, but at 
Frankenhausen t; where extensive salt-works have long been carried on, the 
borings were made through 1173 feet to reach the rock-salt. Now, in all this 
thickness, with the exception of the uppermost 93 feet, which consisted of red 
sand, apparently the detritus of the overlying red strata of the country, the 
whole subterranean mass was found to be gypseous, with occasional intercala- 
tions of limestone and argillaceous way-boards, as if to show that the sub- 
* So numerous are these fossil trees, that ten 
of the largest are arranged around a central pyra- 
mid of other and thinner stems on the summit of 
the high road leading from Kelbra to Franken- 
hausen. The large silicified stems on the exte- 
rior, some of them 3 to 4 feet in diameter, form 
seats. One tree, lying in situ, and crossing the 
strata obliquely, measured 42 feet in length, with 
a diameter of 18 inches. 
t See Map of the Kyfh'auser and Frankenhausen, 
Leonhardund Bronn's Neues Jahrb. 1847, pi. 13. 
