Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Descriptive Information

Title

A description of the principal picturesque beauties, antiquities, and geological phoenomena of the Isle of Wight

Description

In his work with Henry Englefield, Thomas Webster applied the new geohistorical mapping approach to the Isle of Wight (A description of the principal picturesque beauties, antiquities, and geological phenomena of the Isle of Wight, 1816). Webster made several key observations in his map and cross-section of the Isle, both displayed here, that extended Cuvier and Brongniart’s stratigraphy from the Paris Basin across the Channel. First, he recognized units above (and therefore younger) than the oldest Secondary layer (the “Chalk”) that had similar fossils to those identified in the Paris Basin. In addition, both the Secondaries and the younger units were tilted and folded, which revealed a history of buckling that was both unique to the Isle, and very recent relative to the age of the Secondaries. Finally, Webster correlated his “Isle of Wight Basin” with the Paris Basin to interpret similar environments, both marine and freshwater, that must have extended across the present-day Channel at some point in the past. Webster’s discovery that the units above the Chalk had continental-scale coverage would eventually lead to the organization of a new delineation of geologic time, which Alexandre Brongniart, borrowing from Giovanni Brocchi’s classification, would refer to as “Tertiary”.

Call Number (click link to view in library catalog)

Q. 914.228 EN3D

Authors

Englefield, Henry

Full Title

A description of the principal picturesque beauties, antiquities, and geological phoenomena of the Isle of Wight / by Sir Henry C. Englefield ; with additional observations on the strata of the island and their continuation in the adjacent parts of Dorsetshire by Thomas Webster ; illustrated by maps and numerous engravings by W. and G. Cooke, from the original drawings by Sir H. Englefield and T. Webster.

Date

1816

From the Exhibit

In Search of Lost Time: Maps and Cross-Sections

Publisher

W. Bulmer and Co

Location

London

Language

English

Rights

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Type

Text

Medium

Book

Bibliographic Citation

Englefield, Henry, and Webster, Thomas. A description of the principal picturesque beauties, antiquities, and geological phenomena of the Isle of Wight. London: W. Bulmer and Co., 1816