THE 
LOWER OOLITIC ROCKS 
OP 
ENGLAND 
(YORKSHIRE EXCEPTED). 
CHAPTER I. 
INTRODUCTION. 
The term Oolitic General Character and Thickness of the Rocks 
Physical Conditions of the Period Sequence of Strata and 
Extent of the Formations. 
THE Oolitic rocks form a series far more interesting and 
diversified than the Lias upon which they rest. Over parts of 
the area the two divisions occur in uninterrupted sequence, but 
there is a broad difference between the essentially argillaceous 
formation of the Lias, and the alternating series of limestones, 
eands, and thick beds of clay, of which the Oolitic group is 
composed. 
Most of the limestones are characterized by a structure 
resembling the roe of a fish, such as the cod : hence the name 
" roestone " came to be applied by the quarrymen, and this has 
been translated, in the language of science, into Oolite. Rocks of 
this character were described by Pliny,* but the term Oolithus ap- 
pears to have been first introduced as a petrological name in 1727 
by F. E. Bruckmann.t It was not until 1803 that the name 
Oolite was applied in a stratigraphical sense, and then it was 
used by A. J. M. Brochant de Villiers.J Eventually through 
the labours of William Smith, followed by those of Conybeare, 
* See J. Morton, Nat. Hist. Northamptor shire, 1712, pp. 99, 248. 
f The' name is mentioned in Bruckmaun's Historia Naturalis curiosa Lapidis, 
1727, p. 7. See Da Costa, Nat. Hist. Fossils, 1757, p. 130 ; also J. Kidd, Outlines of 
Mineralogy, vol. i., 1809, p. 26 ; and Jameson, System of Mineralogy, rol. i. p. 504. 
% Mineral, elem., vol. i. pp. 523, 529. 
E 75928. * 
