Loess in Russia III: Andrei Dodonov

Remembering Andrei Dodonov 1940-2008; a distinguished loessperson.. a great Russian.

Loess in Russia II: Trofimov in Europe

Another sketch map- this one from V.T.Trofimov's 2001 book on Loess. This really is a simple map but its a very satisfactory map. That large patch of loess is called the USWR loess, its region J1 on the Jefferson classification of loess in the Soviet Union. This by far the largest and most important patch of loess in the region that was the Soviet Union. Here the great problems of hydrocollapse and subsidence were encountered- just there by Rostov-on-Don was the Atommash factory where one of the classic subsidence failures occurred.
The J1 loess is glacial loess; this really is glacial loess- the particles made by continental glaciers- and then distributed by the rivers Dnepr, Don & Volga; all nicely shown. In the region were the great loess research institutes at Kiev, Dneprpetrovk and Moscow.  In this region (just to the NW) the ideas about Russian loess were shaped- at Leningrad, by Dokuchaev and Berg.

Here is the Black Earth- the default chernozem- the last great hope of Mankind. The FAO has estimated that in Eurasia about half of the chernozem soils remain to be exploited; we shall have enough to eat for a few more years. Chernozem forms in loess; parent material is more important than climate; Berg believed the opposite- in some places the discussion is still going on..

Loess in Russia I

Loess in Russia; Loess in Russia proper; Loess in the Russian language; Loess within the confines of the Soviet Union. A major target for loess scholars- closing the gap between loess studies in Russian, and loess studies in western languages, in particular English. A useful reference:

Jefferson, I.F., Evstatiev, D., Karastenev, D., Mavlyanova, N.G., Smalley, I.J.  2003.  Engineering geology of loess and loess-like deposits: a commentary on the Russian literature.  Engineering Geology 68, 333-351. 

This is our starting point; its an EG paper but its of general loess interest.  The Abelev & Abelev 1968 map of loess in the Soviet Union was reprinted and used as a basis for regional labelling. The Abelev Abelev map is now old and it is nominally an EG map but it does give a clear view of the various regions; not a clear and detailed view- but then there was no Soviet map which gave a clear and detailed view of loess distribution.  We shall call them Jefferson J regions for convenience:

J1  The Western regions
J2  The Caucasus
J3  Middle Asia & southern Kazakhstan
J4  Western Siberia: Orsk-Omsk
J5  Tomsk-Barnaul
J6  Kansk-Krasnoyarsk
J7  Irkutsk

 

Nikolai Ivanovich KRIGER: Loessperson

Kriger was a great loess scholar and published vast amounts of material on loess. He worked with Marton Pecsi within the confines of the INQUA Loess Commission- mostly on practical problems with loess. He was concerned with the connection between loess and aridity. His major work was his book on loess as a geographical entity which was produced for the INQUA Congress in the USA in 1965. Only 1350 copies were printed, and it was not translated into English; it was not as widely appreciated as it should have been. It had a fine bibliography attached, which was published separately by Loess Letter as Supplement 13 in 1986.

Not a great picture; its very hard to find pictures of Kriger. This is enlarged from a group photograph taken at the International Geological Congress in Moscow in 1982. There must be other pictures somewhere; Loess Ground would be very pleased to see them.

 

Loess in Britain XVI: Rye and the River Rother

I have been reading about the extraordinary Benson family; A.C.Benson and E.F.Benson and their father Archbishop of Canterbury Benson. They were a family of writers; I believe AC was said to have written 3000 letters per year and his dairy was eventually 160+ volumes. EF published an autobiography right at the end of his life - 'Final Edition (1940)' and it contains some interesting observations on the town of Rye, where he lived (and was mayor of). Actually the following excerpt is from the introduction by Hugo Vickers:

"The town of Rye stands like a pyramid on an isolated rock, crowned by its fine old church. With Winchelsea it is one of the Cinque Ports, having been added to the original five as far back as the twelth century.

"Rye was in earlier times a haven for smugglers. So many of the innocent looking houses concealed vast intercommunicating cellars, the chimneys contained secret hiding places, stairways were hidden in cupboards."

You see the critical phrase: vast intercommunicating cellars -one of the indicators of loess ground. Its not easy to dig vast intercommunicating cellars; the task is made easier if you are digging in loess. So could it be loess; how is Rye placed as a site for a loess deposit?  Actually- not bad. We could have a local loess deposit at Rye- a bit like the local deposit at Pegwell Bay. At Pegwell Bay the River Stour carries loess material out of the eastern parts of the Weald and concentrates it sufficiently for a real loess deposit to form.  Loess material which had fallen into the southern part of the Weald was concentrated and transported by the River Rother, and deposited at Rye (or nearby). Most of the loess material which fell into the Weald was eventually transported north by the River Medway and contributed to the brickearth deposits in north Kent, but some fell into the catchments of the Stour, and the Rother, and made separate loess deposits on redeposition.

 

This is the Tilley map of SE England loess- redrawn by Colin Bunce

Co-Authors (Largely Loessic) Part Three

The co-author lists are roughly in proper historical order- at least for the first three lists. Part Three contains co-authors 21-30; we edge a bit further east; contact with Wroclaw is revived, the wonders of Vojvodina begin to be appreciated, we venture to Tashkent.

21.  Nadira Mavlyanova.  Uzbekistan to Nottingham. We pursue the 15 loess research targets set by G.A.Mavlyanov. NTU links up with the Seismological Institute in Tashkent. The great Tashkent earthquake destroyed an amazing number of loess buildings. Seismology Institute built at epicentre.

22.  Ken O'Hara-Dhand.  Standing in a quarry in Korshiv, in Ukraine. Admiring the loess, and noticing the sand-martins. The beginnings of the 'birds & loess' project. The properties of loess make it the ideal ground material for sand-martin nesting. Sand martins detect loess; sand martins indicate the presence of loess by living in it.

23.  Zdzislaw Jary.  ZJ was a student of Jerzy Cegla, and now carries a banner for Silesian loess. A series of essays in New Zealand Soil News, and adventures in Polish biobibliography. A shared appreciation of the S.Z.Rozycki book.

24.  Slobodan Markovic.  An extraordinary meeting in 1999, an adventure shared in Moscow, an acquaintance renewed in 2006. A dance around hydroconsolidation and loessification and fragipans and history- but always in the background the great cliffs of Stari Slankamen. A persistence with INQUA, a dawdling beside the Danube, a rumination at Ruma..

25.  Sue McLaren.  Birds again; ZJ proposed that bee-eaters were the birds to study; so bee-eaters in Europe, Africa, India and Australia were examined. The 'Heneberg Compromise' was invented and invoked. The bee-eater as environmental engineer was pursued worldwide. In Europe the relationship of bird to loess is explicit; in Australia the relationship is speculative- but where loess should be in Oz- there are bee eaters.

26.  Mladen Jovanovic.  History.  We identify Karl Caesar von Leonhard 1824, Charles Lyell 1833, Heinrich Georg Bronn 1830, Samuel Hibbert 1832, Leonard Horner 1836 and recognise the beginnings of loess scholarship.

27.  Tivadar Gaudenyi.  The first publication of the word loess in English was possibly by Sam.Hibbert in his book on Eifel volcanos(sic). Hibbert published a map of part of the Eifel region; maybe the first mapping of loess?

28.  Zorica Svircev.  Cyan-bacteria; the role of bacteria in the formation of loess deposits. Loess on Mars and Titan and other distant places. We await definite recognition of loess on Mars; of course if there is no geological mechanism available to make loess  material we will wait in vain.

29.  Arya Assadi-Langroudi.  Packing.  Loess as a packing.  Loess as a collapsible soil (ground). Is loess the only geological system where packing is of any consequence?  Is the packing parameter only to be studied with respect to loess?  The loess connection at UEL moves from Hugh Nugent to AAL.

30.  Roger Fagg.  Timaru; John Hardcastle.  Timaru is important in the history of the study of loess. At Timaru in 1889 John Hardcastle formulated the basic concepts of loess stratigraphy. At Timaru JH invented scientific palaeoclimatology. And he had a firm appreciation of the action of glaciers in the formation of loess material and loess deposits.

 

Co-Authors (Largely Loessic) Part Two

Part two contains more co-authors, numbers 11-20 of those agreeable people sharing title pages; from biobibliography to the geomorphology of the Shire, and serious topics like hydroconsolidation and slope stability.

11.  Jewel Davin.  Bibliographer.  Jewel was the librarian at the Lower Hutt headquarters of the DSIR Soil Bureau in New Zealand. A great library- a bibliographic bonus; but DSIR delivered another bibliographic treasure- they published a series of 'Bibliographic Reports' which, since they were in effect in house journals, could be adapted to special requirements. BR28 and BR30 are masterpieces (I make this claim); we did loess in NZ, and fragipans- very satisfying.

12.  Jan Piotrowski. From Poland to Waterloo, Ontario. Jan came to do post-graduate work on drumlins, and did a brilliant map of the famous Woodstock drumlin field. He moved on to become a guru of glacial geology, to do great work for INQUA, and to flourish in Aarhus.

13.  Edward Derbyshire.  The Centre for Loess Research & Documentation at Leicester University. Studies on slope stability in the thick loess at Lanzhou in China. The NATO conference on Collapsible Soils, organised by ED and held at Loughborough University. The LoessFest Conference at Heidelberg & Bonn, organised by ED, and Ludwig Zoeller and me; a wonderful event.

14.  Tom Dijkstra. Tom joined the loess world to participate in the Loess Landslides project in Lanzhou. We wrote on packing and collapse, and he got his PhD from Utrecht University. We also produced plausible explanations for the collapse of the Teton Dam in Idaho, which (rather foolishly) had been built of loess.

15.  C.D.F.Rogers.  When the soil mechanics laboratory at Leicester University suddenly closed the Lanzhou landslide project was in danger of collapse, but Chris Rogers at Loughborough University came to the rescue. A sudden rush of papers on particle packing, on hydroconsolidation, on silt (the seminal paper on silt)- and calculations of the mode particle shape of loess particles- which turned out to be Zingg 3m blades.

16.  A.M. Assallay.  Bashir Assallay suddenly arrived at Loughborough proposing to do a PhD on Loess in Libya. Good timing; model studies of hydroconsolidation, and some validation of the Bryant theory of fragipan formation. He showed that there was an optimum clay content for collapse; too little clay- no collapse; too much clay- no collapse; but just right- then classic hydroconsolidation.

17.  Ian Jefferson. The contract with NATO to investigate loess ground in Bulgaria. The idea was to bury nuclear waste in thick loess; protected from above, and below, by clay-rich palaeosols. We worked with the Academy of Sciences in Sofia and designed an outline repository to sit beside the reactors at Kozloduy, beside the Danube. There was a halt at that point as the funds ran out, but we think it is being built now.

18.  Susan Dibben. Modelling of loess ground structures (for collapse studies) went in two directions: we invented the formation of the test sample by simply depositing model loess in an oedometer test ring (a method used by Bashir), and also the idea of using simple Monte Carlo methods to build computer models. Susan did computer models and they were very convincing.

19.  Sally Bijl. The Bucklebury Ferry Smial of the Tolkien Society. The amazing realisation that the hobbits lived in a loess landscape; the Brandywine River is a yellow river (from the Elvish Baranduin- golden). If you live in a hole in the ground the odds are that the ground is loess. This led on to an appreciation of the glacierized nature of the landscape to the north (the drumlins of Arnor) and the fact that the hated brick houses in the Shire had been built of loess bricks, made probably at Stock. They were, ironically enough, Stock bricks. UK brick collectors will appreciate this.

20.  Hugh Nugent. Packing; it has turned out that that loess is the only sediment in which particle packing is really important, and that loess is the only truly collapsible ground. Loess collapses inwards when it collapse; many so-called collapsible grounds simply disperse when the 'collapse' event occurs; quick clays are like this. So we keep on looking at packing. HN has so far done the only 'looking down' packing studies; all other packing studies are 'looking sideways' studies.
. 

Co-Authors (Largely Loessic) Part One

When I started writing papers in the 1960s I had an ambition to have 100 co-authors. This target has been hit (exceeded); this is a study of some of the co-authors- possibly the most notable.

1.  Valerie Smalley.  Properly the first co-author; the most important person in my life. A rather reluctant co-author- but we did an interesting note in Nature on the tensile strength of granular materials; and a useful review on loess for a Sedimentology book by Messrs.Brookfield & Ahlbrandt.

2.  Claudio Vita-Finzi.  I went to UCL and met Claudio; almost immediately he proposed a joint paper- we wrote on Desert Loess (for J.Sed.Pet.), and then on Systems Theory for GSAB. Desert loess did well and provoked some responses.



 Claudio Vita-Finzi

3.  David Unwin.  Talented people were jostling around at UCL. Dave Unwin wanted to publish a paper in J.Glaciology so we wrote on drumlin formation. This also proved popular and it turned out that we had been more creative than we realised.

4.  R.U.Cooke.  Another UCL star; Ron Cooke was a fairly junior person back then (we all predicted great things). He wanted to have a piece in Nature so we wrote on salt weathering in deserts. A few simple calculations of thermal expansion, but very popular & long-lasting.

5.  J.G.Cabrera. From Bolivia to Leeds; with Joe Cabrera a long term cooperation (1968-1978). I can make some careful claims: we published the first SEM picture of the structure of a clay soil in Nature (we might claim this as the first clay SEM)- no doubt about the first SEM picture of loess material in GSAB. Joe was there at the beginning of the first dive into thermogravimetry and helped set up the first thermobalances. He was interested in the Red Soils (the laterites) and these make good subjects for TG examination. We published the basic paper for the 'inactive particle' theory of quick clay behaviour.

6. R.L.S.Taylor.  Dick Taylor was the great leader and activator of the South London Astronomical Society. We wrote several papers for Science Journal. SJ was set up as a sort of British version of Scientific American, and it appeared to be doing quite well (making a modest profit) when it was suddenly closed down by the publishers; a shame, an opportunity missed.

7.  Jerzy Cegla.  We had great plans but we only published one paper together; the first SEM studies of the Polish loess. Jerzy established the link to Wroclaw but was killed in a tragic accident and a great geo-scientist was lost.

Jerzy Cegla

8.  David Krinsley. At Queens College (CUNY) and Churchill College (Cambridge) and various other places. The great pioneer of the SEM study of sand grain surfaces, and a very keen co-author. Sponsored me for my membership of the New York Academy of Sciences- which led indirectly to the whole Loess History project. We published a popular paper on Sand in American Scientist; and we pointed out that loess particles are Zingg 3 blades in Science. Dave was keen to publish in Science, and it did prove a very popular paper.

9.  Stephen Bentley.  The apotheosis of the TG work. Steve applied the thermobalances to the Canadian quick clays- essentially seeking to characterise and measure the clay mineral content. Success with the St.Jean Vianney clay, and an indication of a very low clay mineral content.
Also some neat studies on potassium hydrogen phthalate to establish it as a useful thermal standard.

10. J.A.Leach.  Andrew Leach- is the co-author on the 1978 paper on the Danube loess. Can we claim the beginning of serious studies of loess across the whole Danube basin?- why not. A seminal paper which had a lasting influence. The beginnings of the march to the East- eventually we would be encamped in Vojvodina, enjoying the best of the Danubian loess.

see Part Two for Co-Authors 11-20

 

Reprint Request Postcards

Back when the World was young scholars used to send and receive reprint requests  'please send me your interesting paper on ...'  It was pleasing to get a request- somebody had read and appreciated your work.  With the arrival of email and the internet all that has passed; no more do we see those specially designed cards..   I wonder if there is any reason to keep a pile of old cards?  do these have philatelic interest?  might they end up in some museum of scientific communication?

Random thoughts on Shape [a rectangular proposal]

There is a very modest literature on the shape of loess particles; there is a fairly extensive literature on the size of loess particles. The size of the particles comprising a loess deposit is seen as one of the chief characteristics of the deposit. Another major characteristic is the open structure, the loose packing of particles- which confers on the loess deposit its interesting metastability and allows for collapsibility- usually via the hydroconsolidation mechanism. The shape of the particles has some effect on the nature of the packing.

It has been proposed that the default shape of a loess particle is a tabular, blade shape of fairly extreme proportions ( Rogers & Smalley 1993). There have been two approaches to the calculation of the expected shapes of loess particles: a very simple probabilistic approach which indicated that most silt particles would be of a Zingg class 3m nature (i.e. blades) and a slightly more sophisticated approach which supported this idea and suggested that the proportions of the Zingg box would be 8:5:2. That is a very flat box to contain the typical loess particle.

A word about Zingg. One of a range of proposals for defining particle shape the Zingg method utilised the ratio of the sides of the typical box which contained the particle. There is an explanation in the Pettijohn book on 'Sedimentary Rocks' - there is another explanation in Smalley 1966.
Zingg named or defined four shapes: class 1 the disc, where a = b > c, a flattish particle; class 2 the sphere or cube, where a = b =c ; the blade where a >b >c; and the stick or rod where a = b < c. The probabilistic calculation,( with a 10% accuracy) showed that 72% of silt particles would be of Zingg class 3 (an obvious and intuitive result). The nice thing about the Zingg approach was that it allowed numbers to be deployed for the first time in shape discussions. The 72% was the first calculation of the amount of shape.

Rogers, C.D.F., Smalley, I.J.  1993.  The shape of loess particles.  Naturwissenschaften 80, 461-462.

Smalley, I.J.  1966.  The expected shapes of blocks and grains. Journal of Sedimentary Petrology 36, 626-629.

Howarth, J.  2010.  The shape of loess particles reviewed.  Open Geosciences 2, 41-44.

Digression on Zingg, by Domokos et al 2010.  By considering the ellipsoid, Smalley's modified Zingg classes are given as I a =b >c disc, II a = b= c sphere, III a >b >c blade and IV a > b =c rod. The classical Zingg approach and Smalley's approach can be unified if an internal parameter              O </=p</=1 is introduced, the classical Zingg system corresponds to p = 2/3, Smalley's suggestion corresponds to p = 1.

Domokos, G., Sipas, A., Szabo, T., Varkoniji, P.  2010.  Pebble shape and equilibrium. Mathematical geosciences 42, 29-47 doi 10.1007/5 11004-009-9520-4

The simple Monte Carlo method produces a Zingg III shape with proportions 8:5:2. This has not been improved upon since 1993 but it still seems a bit extreme. This is a very blade shaped particle; it could certainly contribute to an extremely open packing if delivered by some suitable airfall method. Now the basic approach is to be deployed again on a very speculative venture- to determine the random shape of a closed depression in a loess deposit (what we call a 'Hardcastle Hollow' in NZ).
Wending its way to probable publication in Geomorphology is a paper by Kolodynska-Gawrysiak et al on 'Closed depressions' in loess landscapes which provokes a thought on the nature of these depressions- and their possibly random (plan) shapes.

John Hardcastle wrote in 1908: "Peculiar features of the Timaru loess are the numerous hollows in the surface, the larger of which, half an acre to an acre or two in extent, in their natural state retained water enough to allow peat and sedges to flourish in them."  Could this be a random dispersion of random shaped depressions?  Can we generate some random lake shapes; the question becomes can we generate random rectangles?- and what is the default random rectangle?.


Generating the random rectangle- using the Rogers-Smalley method: We need random numbers; we take them from the Kendall & Babington Smith random number tables- this may seem like a rather antique method of generating random numbers but it does guarantee that the numbers are properly random; the KBS numbers have been tested for randomness. We operate over a restricted number range, 1-10   -so generate 40 random numbers- that gives 20 rectangles- arrange in 2 columns (as generated) with large sides in one column, small sides in another
10   2
9     4
10   5
4     1
2     2
7     2
9     4
4     3
9     3
6     4
10   4
3     2
10   7
10   2
7     4
1     1
7     6
9     5
10   4
8     2

There we are- 20 rectangles; now add up each column; 145 and 67, thus 145/67 gives our default rectangle = 2.23: 1. Do this lots of times and get a real average value.

Random subsidence in a landscape of collapsible loess; we have a Zingg box (2d variety) for the closed depressions formed. If Zingg measures are done the shape of the enclosed depressions will be defined (when averages are taken) by the default rectangle. This is the 2d version of the 3d Rogers-Smalley loess particle. There are probably proper mathematical ways of calculating the side ratio for the default rectangle. It would be useful if they could be investigated- because they could probably be used on the default loess particle

There is an elegant and thorough study of depressions in Romania which provides some real data on the shape of closed depressions in loess deposits:

Grecu, F., Eftene, A., Ghita, C., Benabbas, C.  2015.  The loess micro-depressions within the Romanian plain; Morphometric and morphodynamic analysis. Revista de geomorfologie 17, 5-18.

An analysis of length and breadth measurements shows ratios around the 2:1 mark; more study of these results is indicated.

 New Year 2017: a few more tests on the random rectangle- tend to support the idea that the random rectangle is a 2:1 rectangle. We find references to random collapsed regions in the S.Z.Rozycki book on loess- more details later.

John Hardcastle: Early Days

After the discussion at the South Canterbury Museum on 22 September 2016 on John Hardcastle and the invention of loess stratigraphy there is a need for some more details about JH- in particular his early life. He arrived in NZ on the Maori in 1858, aged eleven.

Beth Tupper, JH's grand-daughter has supplied some details of this early life. JH was born in Wakefield, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, on 21st January 1847, and was the eldest of a family of twelve. Three generations of the family farmed in Hunsingore, in Nidderdale, and John's father Thomas was born there. He married Caroline Hebb in 1846 when he was 29. John and the next child, Thomas, were born in Wakefield. Then the family moved to Allington, near Grantham, in Lincolnshire, where they had a small farm. John lived there from age 3 to 11 and went to the village school.

 

History of Loess Research- A Study Group

History of Loess Research- A Study Group.  Secretary: Dr. Tivadar Gaudenyi, Geographical Institute, 'Jovan Cvijic', Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia

Jovanovich, M., Gaudenyi, T., O'Hara-Dhand, K., Smalley, I.J.  2013.  Karl Caesar von Leonhard (1779-1862) and the beginnings of loess research in the Rhine valley.  Quaternary International 334/5, 4-9.

Smalley, I.J., Gaudenyi, T., Jovanovic, M.  2014.  Charles Lyell and the loess deposits of the Rhine valley.  Quaternary International 372, 45-50.

Smalley, I.J., Kels, H., Gaudenyi, T., Jovanovic, M.  2016.  Loess encounters of three kinds: Charles Lyell talks about, reads about, and looks at loess.  GeoLogos 22, 71-77.

Liu Tungsheng: 2 pictures

Two pictures of Liu Tungsheng; also in the picture at the New Zealand Soil Bureau- Ian Smalley(with tie) and Martin te Punga of the NZ Geological Survey..

 

Dashing Rocks loess, Timaru NZ

This is a drone view of the famous Dashing Rocks loess at Timaru in the South Island of New Zealand. Here John Hardcastle made the first observations of loess stratigraphy in 1889.

 

 

The Shire as a Loess Region: further considerations

"In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit" -one of the most famous opening sentences. It opened the door (a round door) to the world of the hobbits and the whole history of Middle Earth.  There are three nouns in this sentence; the hobbits have become famous and have accrued a vast literature, but the 'hole' and the 'ground' have been rather neglected- however there is more to be said about 'the hole in the ground', and much discussion to be had  What parameters determine the nature of the hole? what controls the size and nature of the hole?  What sort of ground is the hole excavated in?  How does the nature of the ground affect the nature of the hole?  What grounds are good for holes and where are they located? 

We edge towards the world of soil mechanics for a discussion of the nature of the hole, and we will need to invoke the 'Heneberg Compromise' when discussing the construction of holes. We need to invoke some geomorphological knowledge when it comes to examining the nature of the ground, and we will need a careful interpretation of the few facts and descriptions that Tolkien has given us. Tolkien was a man of words, so the words he has left us need to be examined properly and conscientiously. Take the Brandywine River for example- a case which bears instantly on our discussion. This is properly called the Baranduin and Tolkien noted that it was a yellow river (a golden river), it was a turbid river, it carried a high load of suspended sediment even in the latter days. In glacial times it would have carried a large amount of sediment. The Brandywine defines the Shire.

Tom Shippey provides another sentence: " Creatures that live in holes in the ground ought to be animals- rabbits, moles, snakes, gophers, badgers- and 'hole' conveys a poor impression as a place to live.'  In fact the classic hole living creatures are birds, and in particular members of the family Meropidae- the bee-eaters. In a hole in the ground there lived a bee-eater. These are successful birds who live in many parts the world. The European Bee-eater (Merops apiaster) likes to live in a hole in a loess deposit (as do hobbits).  The bee-eaters have the status of environmental engineers and provide living space for a whole host of creatures.
The geotechnical factors which affect a bee-eater dwelling also affect a hobbit house. The Heneberg Compromise (named for Petr Heneberg of the University of Vienna) points to the need to balance, in the ground being considered, the ease of excavateability and the stability of the opening, the strength of the ground. Easy excavation in weak ground can lead to a collapsible tunnel. Choice of an over-strong ground means great difficulties in excavation. This is why Merops apiaster lives in loess deposits; loess provides a strong rigid ground which can be easily excavated. This is why thousands of Chinese people live in loess houses. Tom Shippey wrote from Leeds, one of the few places that does not experience bee-eaters. Glorious birds living in fantastic colonies- whole cities of holes, conveying a wonderful impression of a place to live.

The similarity of hobbit and bee-eater dwellings offers the strong suggestion that the Shire is loess country; that the geo-conditions were right for the formation of a substantial loess deposit which the hobbits could subsequently exploit. The deterministic approach to the processes of loess deposit formation can be applied to the Shire situation; all the requirements are in place. The loess material can be produced in the cold north, perhaps by continental glaciers, but also by mountain glaciers. This material is carried to the south by the Brandywine river (causing the turbidity) and is deposited on floodplains, and then blown inland. The Shire deposits should be thickest by the river but data on thickness may not be available. Great deposits do exist alongside rivers, the Danube bluffs are an excellent example.
The mountains and the river are well placed, and the descriptions of the Shire fit well with an inhabited temperate loess landscape. The Shire entry in the Tolkien Gateway speaks of a place which is "small but beautiful and fruitful".  Soils developed on loess are the most productive, the classic productive soil is a loess soil, loess regions are fruitful regions. Loess is good for agriculture and it also good for making bricks. Loess is a surficial deposit; access is easy so it is no surprise that early brick buildings in England were built in regions where loess (called brickearth) was found.

Loess bricks have a part to play in the history of the Shire. While Frodo and friends are away dealing with the problem of the Ring the Shire experiences bad times- there is much wanton destruction and quite a lot of unwanted construction. Brick houses are built and much constructional vandalism occurs. And this occurs in a fairly short time; the great adventure takes a few years so it is rapid vandalism, and the really bad times, after the arrival of Saruman, are short. Is there time to produce enough bricks to do the reported damage. It seems unlikely that the hobbit brickyards carried large stocks so bricks had to be made quickly. This points to easily accessible loess ground being turned into bricks- it is hard to see any other earth material being available for this rapid production.

Some literature
Smalley,I., Bijl,S. 1993.  Hobbit holes as loess dwellings and the Shire as a loess region. Amon Hen 122, online at Scribd.com

Smalley,I., OHaraDhand, K., McLaren, S., Nugent, H.  2012.  Loess and bee-eaters I: Ground properties affecting the nesting of European bee-eaters (Merops apiaster L1758) in loess deposits.  Quaternary International 296, 220-226.

Afterthought: the Great East Road.  The Great East Road - ran East-West through Eriador, crossing the Greenway at Bree- from the Grey Havens, through the Shire, through Bree to near Rivendell and over the Misty Mountains, even through Mirkwood. This was a very old road, and it is logical that as it passed through the Shire it would gradually be transformed into a sunken road. This is a characteristic of roads in loess regions, long-term usage causes the road surface to sink, for the road to run in a pronounced valley. People passing though the Shire on the Great East Road would be travelling in a fairly deep valley, largely unaware of the land on either side. Travellers on a major route, particularly a sunken route are often unaware of their surroundings (eg travellers on the M1 road rushing through Leicestershire). There are hints in the writings that the hobbits were undetected, that travellers on the Great East Road were not aware that the Shire was an inhabited region. Travellers on the Great East Road were isolated in their loess valley.

Loess in Britain XV: Essex

Warren, S.H.  1942.  The drifts of south-western Essex.  Essex Naturalist 27 (part 5, Ap-Sept 1942) 155-163;  27 (part 6, Oct 1942- Nov 1943)  171-179.

"Hallsford-  I call the exposures here my key sections to unlock certain of the secrets of the local geology" [Zeuner's Hallsford loess must be here].

"The other pit is that of the Hallsford Brick & Tile works (E.of High Ongar Road)...  about 3/4 mile SE of Chipping Ongar.  Deposits in fig.1 are:  1. Rainwash, of the Iron Age, up to about 4 ft.  2. Loess, probably of Aurignacian age, up to 8 ft.  3.  a buried land surface..  4. Chalky Jurassic Boulder clay..  5. glacial sands.  6. pebble gravel..  7.  London clay."

"The Hallsford loess- although this is only a small local deposit-  it is one of exceptional interest which Dr. Zeuner has analyses;  he finds it to be a true wind-borne loess (a steppe deposit) of continental type, which was formerly thought to be absent from this country."

Gruhn, R., Bryan, A.L., Moss, A.J.  1974.  A contribution to Pleistocene chronology in south-east Essex, England.  Quaternary Research 4, 53-75


Eden, D.N.  1980.  The loess of North-East Essex, England.  Boreas 9, 165-177.

A thin mantle of cover-loam over much of north-east Essex has been recognised as consisting of loess.  The cover-loam represents the intermixing, to a varying degree, of a layer of loessial silt with a thin layer of underlying sand which is also of likely aeolian origin. The heavy mineral content of the coarse silt fraction of north-east Essex loess is generally similar to that of the last glaciation age loesses elsewhere in eastern England, Belgium and the Netherlands.  This suggests the north-east Essex loess is part of a single loess sheet deposited over Eastern England and parts of western Europe. Nevertheless

...  detailed examination of the heavy minerals content from all of these areas reveals slight areal variations especially in the proportion of hornblende. These differences show the coarse silt from NE Essex loess to have closest affinities with that from Norfolk. A distant source for the loess within the present North Sea basin is proposed on textural evidence. Loess accumulation in NE Essex probably commenced in the few thousand years leading up to the maximum extent of Devensian ice (about 18,000 BP) and may have continued to about 14,000 BP.

 

Loess in Britain XIV: HS2

HS2 is a new railway to connect London and Birmingham; to facilitate the flow of commuters in and out of London from the nearby north. This is a major engineering project which will have interesting foundation implications. Its interesting from the LiB point of view because it will be built in the 'Loess Affected Zone' of SE England. Some preliminary studies (Assadi-Langroudi 2016) have indicated that the Hertfortshire loam sequence which HS2 will cross is very similar to the loessic situation at Ospringe. The LAZ reaches just about to Birmingham and thus loess foundation problems might be encountered. The loess problem will not be as acute as it was with the estuary airport but it will require consideration .  

                                                                                                                                              

Loess in Britain XIII Dates & Dating

Wintle A.G.  1981.  Thermoluminescence dating of late Devensian loesses in southern England. Nature 289, 479-480 (05 Feb 1981)  doi:10. 1038/289479a0.

This Ann Wintle piece in Nature is a pioneering application of luminescence dating of loess; maybe the first TL study of loess in UK?

Gibbard, P.L., Wintle, A.G.,  Catt,J.A.  1987.  Age and origin of clayey silt 'brickearth' in west London.  Journal of Quaternary Science  2,  3-9

Clarke, M.L., Milodowski, A.E.,  Bouch, J.E.,  Leng, M.J.,  Northmore, K.J.  2007.  New OSL dating of UK loess; indications of two phases of Late Glacial dust accretion in SE England and climate implications.  Journal of Quaternary Science  22,  361-371.

Ann Wintle:
"Scattered across southern England are many isolated deposits of loess-like material. A few, such as that at Pegwell Bay in Kent, are highly calcareous and unweathered but most have been reworked by fluvial or colluvial processes. There is good stratigraphical evidence for a few pre-Devensian loesses, also in Kent , but dating of more recent loess has so far been based on indirect evidence. Much work has been done on the Pegwell Bay loess as it is the most extensive, truly aeolian loessic deposit in Britain. Kerney compared the late Devensian deposits in the Isle of Thanet and at Pegwell Bay with similar deposits in Holland and Belgium where radiocarbon dates have been obtained for interstadial deposits. Correlations of the East Kent deposits with these in Northern Europe indicates that the loesses in Kent were formed between 30,000 and 14,000 yr.ago. I report here dates for six of the more recent deposits in southern Britain from the Scilly Isles to Kent.  The dates have been obtained on the loess itself, using a recently developed thermoluminescence technique, and confirm the ages as being late Devensian."  (AGW 1981)

Loess in Britain XII: The Weald

Burrin, P.J.  1981.  Loess in the Weald.  Proceedings of the Geologists Association  92,  87-92

Wooldridge, S.W.  1932.  Soil and civilization in South East England.  South Eastern Naturalist and Antiquary 37,  56-58

Wooldridge, S.W., Linton, D.L.  1933.  The loam terrains of South East England and their relation to its early history.  Antiquity 7, 297-310.

 "The overall impression gained from these studies is that loess or loessal-derived sediments may be widely distributed in the Weald.  However, a recent discussion on the contribution of loess to soils in lowland Britain (Catt 1978) reports that reconnaissance of large areas of the Weald, especially the Weald Clay outcrop, revealed insignificant amounts of loessal material. Clearly there is controversy as to whether or not loess, or loessal-derived deposits, exist in this area, and in this context the results of a continuing research programme in the Weald are of relevance."  (Burrin 1981)

 

Loess in Britain XI A.S.Kennard (1870-1948)

Preece, R.C.  1990.  Alfred Santer Kennard (1870-1948) : his contribution to malacology, Quaternary research and the Geologists Association.  Proceedings of the Geologists Association 101, 239-258.

A.S.Kennard b. London 5 July 1870, died at 161 Mackenzie Road, Beckenham on 11 June 1948. President of the Geologists Association 1944-1945.

Kennard, A.S.  1895.  Pleistocene Mollusca of Crayford.  Science Gossip ns 2, 39-40.

"There are shells comprising a typical loess fauna from 'Reculver, Kent' in his collection in the BMNH (Natural History Museum) and these have come from the primary loess that blankets the Tertiaries at this site" (Preece 1990)

Loess in Britain X Brick buildings

Wight, J.A.  1972.  Brick Building in England: From the Middle Ages to 1550.  John Baker, 4, 5 & 6 Soho Square, London,  439p.

Smalley, I.J.  1987.  The nature of 'brickearth' and the location of early brick buildings in Britain. British Brick Society Information no.41, 4-11.

Smalley, I.J.  1985/6.  Loess bricks in Britain.  Bulletin of the Experimental Firing Group 4, 55-66 (reprinted in Loess Letter 70, 4-15, 2013; see www.loessletter.msu.edu).

If the loess/brickearth is concentrated in the south-east of England then the brick buildings should also be there. In particular the early brick buildings- built from bricks made from easily accessible local brickearth. Jane Wight has a great map in her book.

An interesting feature of this map is the way that the Weald region is outlined by a lack of buildings. The Weald was a region lacking in loess- there had been loess deposited in the Weald by the same events which spread loess material over the North and South Downs, but the Wealden material was carried away by local rivers.. 

Many of the early brick buildings in London were built from the Thames valley brickearths. The most spectacular brick building in Britain is probably Hampton Court Palace- arguably the most impressive loess deposit in the country

 

Loess in Britain IX Reculver

It has been suggested (O'Hara-Dhand 2015; pers.comm.)  that there could be an interesting loess deposit at Reculver, on the North Kent coast (the coast of Herne Bay and Whitstable).  Reculver is near to Ospringe; the loess is the North Kent loess, sitting on top of the chalk of the North Downs.
There are rumours that palaeosols have been detected in the Reculver loess; it would certainly be useful if some palaeosols can be found. The thickish loess in south Essex does contain palaeosols- and we need more palaeosols in southern England. The loess on the chalk of the North and South Downs is remarkably widespread- more investigation needed here.

Preece, R.C.  1990.  The molluscan fauna of Late Devensian loess from Reculver, Kent.  Journal of Conchology 33, 295

Loess in Britain VIII The Ospringe Project

The Ospringe project was a NERC-funded study of the nature of the soil structure collapse phenomenon in loess ground [the process sometimes known as hydroconsolidation or hydrocollapse]. It started at the Windy Day meeting at Nottingham Trent University on the 2nd April 1997.  The initial structure of the project was sketched out on the same day, on the train from Nottingham to Leicester. It eventually involved several universities (Loughborough, Leicester, Nottingham Trent) and the British Geological Survey at Keyworth.  It eventually ended in 2015 with the publication of the 'mineralogy & fabric' paper.

Milodowski, A.E.,  Northmore, K.J.,  Kemp, S.J.,  Entwisle, D.C.,  Gunn, D.A.,  Jackson, P.D.,  Boardman, D. I.,  Zoumpakis, A.,  Rogers, C.D.F.,  Dixon, N.,  Jefferson, I.,  Smalley, I.J., Clarke, M.   2015.  The mineralogy and fabric of 'Brickearth'  in Kent, UK and their relationship to engineering behaviour.  Bulletin of Engineering Geology and the Environment  74,  1187-1211

In this detailed paper you can find a very satisfactory explanation of the mechanism of hydroconsolidation- which in effect shows how the metastable loess deposit formed by aeolian  deposition takes on the property of collapsibility which allows hydroconsolidation to happen, and may lead to subsidence in some situations. Note the separation of metastability and collapsibility, and the assigning of separate causes. The development of collapsibility might be thought of as an aspect of loessification- this was discussed by Smalley & Markovic(2014)- a spin-off from Milodowski et al (2015) which actually appeared before the key paper was published.

Smalley, I.J., Markovic, S.B.  2014.  Loessification and hydroconsolidation:  there is a connection.  Catena 117,  94-99. 

Zourmpakis, A., Boardman, D.I.,  Rogers, C.D.F., Jefferson, I.,  Gunn, D.A.,  Jackson, P.D.,  Northmore, K.J.,  Entwisle, D.C.,  Nelder, L.M., Dixon, N.  2006.  Case study of a loess collapse field trial in Kent, SE England.  Quarterly Journal of Engineering Geology and Hydrogeology 39, 131-150

"..  a field trial of hydrocollapse in loessic  brickearth deposits.  The site chosen was a working quarry used as a source of brickearth for the local brickworks at Ospringe, just east of the town of Faversham.

 

 

 

 

Loess in Britain VII Crayford

Kennard, A.S.  1944.  The Crayford brickearths.  Proceedings of the Geologists Association 55,  121-167.

Smalley, I.J.  1984.  The Crayford brickearths and other loess materials in the Thames valley. Loess Letter no.12,  34-39  (see www.loessletter.msu.edu)

Bull, A.J.  1942.  Pleistocene chronology.  Proceedings of the Geologists Association  53,  1-45.

"During the early and middle parts of this last glaciation, brickearths were spread over the country to the south of the ice-sheets. These brickearths have received much attention at Crayford, where they overlie the Taplow gravels. At Crayford the lower brickearth is about 20 feet thick and contains Elephas primigenius, Rhinoceros antiquitates, and Ovibos moschaties indicative of a cold steppe climate."

Kirkaldy, J.F., Bull, A.J.  1940.  The geomorphology of the rivers of the southern Weald.  Proceedings of the Geologists Association  115-150.

"A further complication, whose widespread occurrence does not appear to have been previously recognized, is that the whole country is mantled with a sheet of fine-grained unstratified brown loam of a loess-like character, which is commonly one to three feet in thickness and occurs al all levels over the area to the north of the Downs."

The Crayford Brickearths Project (of Durham University); report by Beccy Scott in Quaternary Newsletter no.117 February 2009-  this report is easily accessible because it was reprinted in Loess Letter 62 October 2009 pp.34-38; see www.loessletter.msu.edu for online version. There is still action on the Crayford project and Dr.Scott anticipates more progress.

Digression: Corbicula & MIS5
In the Kennard (1944) paper on the Crayford Brickearths  there is a very useful map showing the disposition of the brickearth and the location of of the old brick pits. There is also a section of the deposits based on earlier work by R.H.Chandler (1914); this shows the brickearth divided into an upper deposit and a lower deposit- separated by a 'Cyrena' bed. The bed is roughly at 40-50 feet (~12m) above OD. On the map Cyrena becomes Corbicula- exposed on both sides of the Bexleyheath Line railway. Corbicula- a famous marine bivalve; Pleistocene Corbicula beds act as litho- and climostratigraphic units of fluvial late Lower and Middle Pleistocene warm stage deposits.

Meijer,T., Preece, R.C.  2000.  A review of the occurrence of Corbicula in the Pleistocene of North-West Europe.  Geologie en Mijnbouw 79, 241-255.

Gaudenyi, T., Nenadic, D., Stejic,P., Jovanovic, M., Bogicevic, K.  2015.  The stratigraphy of the Serbian Pleistocene Corbicula beds.  Quaternary International 357,  4-21.

The waters rose after the deposition of the lower brickearth; the Corbicula flourished and left their traces. The climate was warm and sea-levels were high. It suggests that the Corbicula beds may have been deposited during MIS5- the Last Interglacial, so they date roughly to 100,000 BP; the lower loess is older than this, and the upper is younger. The dates obtained for the British loess tend to be younger (see LiB dating section).

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