Twenty Books on Loess: A subjective progression 1700-2000

Books are important in the Loess story: the 20 books are important- are they the most important?- that depends on your interests and your viewpoint. They are listed in roughly chronological order; it is a very subjective list, and selection and discussion relate to personal use and experience.

Every generation enjoys the use of the vast hoard bequeathed to it by antiquity, and transmits that hoard, augmented by fresh acquisitions, to the future ages.                                                                      Lord Macaulay: Essay on Milton

1.  Marsigli 1726

Luigi Ferdinando Marsigli; Danubius Pannonico Mysicus (in Latin) 6 volumes

Marsigli, serving the Austro-Hungarian Empire, was stationed at several convenient places in Central Europe. Convenient that is to make the first European record of loess. His diagrams of the Danube bank were the first representations of loess in situ in a stratigraphic situation. It seems likely that there were earlier representations of loess landscapes in China but we can assign Marsigli priority in Europe. They were published in his great book on the Danube, in 1726. [see LG blog 22 & 25 May 2020]

2.  Leonhard 1824

Karl Caesar von Leonhard; Charakteristik der Felsarten; Joseph Englemann Verlag, Heidelberg. Three volumes published in 1823 & 1824. Descriptions of ground materials; volume 3 contains section 89 Loess; this is the defining and descriptive arrival of the loess concept.

Hambach, U., Smalley, I. 2019. Two critical books in the history of loess investigation 'Charakteristik der Felsarten' by Karl Caesar von Leonhard and 'Principles of Geology' by Charles Lyell. Open Geosciences 11, 447-451. doi:https://10.1515/geo-2019-0032   

3.  Lyell 1833

Charles Lyell; The Principles of Geology; John Murray London 3 volumes 1830-1833. The critical loess material appeared in vol.3. The great success of the Principles meant that loess awareness quickly became worldwide. Lyell revised and republished the Principles throughout his life; the 12th edition was being prepared when he died. The tone became more philosophical as the series progressed and the loess references have disappeared by the time of publication of the 6th edition. Vol.3 (the Loess volume) reached Charles Darwin in Valparaiso in 1834.

4.  Richthofen 1877

F.von Richthofen; China: Ergebnisse eigner Reisen und darauf gegrundeter Studien, 5 vols. Dietrich Reimer Berlin. Loess discussions and descriptions in vol.1.

5.  Free & Stuntz 1911

E.E.Free, S.C.Stuntz; The movement of soil material by the wind, with a bibliography of eolian geology. U.S.Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Soils Bulletin 68, 263p.

6.  Soergel 1919

W.Soergel; Losse, Eiszeiten und palaolithische Kulturen; Carl Fischer Jena 177p

7.  Scheidig 1934

Alfred Scheidig; Der Loss und seine geotechnischen Eigenschaften; Verlag Theodor Steinkopf  Dresden u.Leipzig 233p. [Geologie und Verbreitung, Erdstoffphysik, Erdbaumechanik und Geotechnik der Losse und Losslehme, Schluffe, Silte und anderer Stauberden, Aschen und Staube].

It was 1970; I was in the library of the Sedgwick Museum in Cambridge. I was visiting David Krinsley who was spending a year as visiting fellow at Churchill College. I think I had arranged to meet him at the Sedgwick Museum, I was waiting for him and idly browsing when I came across a catalogue for Otto Koeltz bookseller- and it listed a copy of Scheidig for sale. Up to that moment it had never occurred to me that I could actually own a copy of this mythical book.

8.  Denisov 1953

N.Ya.Denisov; Engineering Properties of Loess and Loess-like Clay Soils. (in Russian) Gosudarstvennoe Izdatel'stvo Moscow 154p. The copy in the Loess Letter Archive is the 2nd edition so its this edition that gets reported; 6000 copies printed. A key work in the study of the hydroconsolidation and structural collapse of loess ground; fig.32 is the iconic picture of the collapse of a canal in Central Asia; when the collapse problem became really apparent- when it began to obsess the geotechnical community in the Soviet Union.

9.  Charlesworth 1957

J.K.Charlesworth; The Quaternary Era (with special reference to its glaciation); Arnold, London, 2 volumes, 1700 pages. The great and amazing Quaternary compilation; two substantial volumes. Volume one contains a substantial section on loess. It seems incredible that someone would attempt a survey of all aspects of the Quaternary- involving a very committed bibliographical effort, although Charlesworth did admit that publications in many languages had escaped him. Unfortunately he used a very complicated reference system (unique to him) which was difficult to use. Volume 2 was so thick that it was difficult to manipulate, but it contained a key section of the bibliographic apparatus.

Chapter 26 (vol.1, pp 511-558) deals with loess and has 709 references listed.

Charlesworth 1957 was an amazing scholarly achievement- a comprehensive study of all the literature on the Quaternary; such a task for one scholar, and such an incredible result. The loess section is still relevant and repays study- there are discoveries to be made in the Charlesworth hoard. He quotes Goethe to this effect "Wer kann was Dummes, wer was Kluges denken; Das nicht die Vorwelt schon gedacht?"

10. Woldstedt 1954

Paul Woldstedt; Das Eiszeitalter: Grundlinien einer Geologie des Quartars. Ferdinand Enke Verlag Stuttgart Bd,1. This is a work in three volumes; vol.1 contains the general discussion on loess; more accessible than the Charlesworth account but lacking the amazing detail.

11. Kriger 1965

N.I.Kriger; Loess, its Characteristics and Relation to the Geographical Environment; Izd-vo Nauka Moscow 296p (in Russian). The critical book in the study of Russian loess. For such an important book it is surprisingly little known and appreciated, OCLC reports that it is held by eight libraries worldwide; add to that one copy in the Loess Letter archive- which was supplied by Alexander Alexiev of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. The impressive bibliography was published separately by Loess Letter (Loess Letter Supplement 13). Only 1350 copies were printed; see Smalley 1980 p.46 for discussion-entry 16 on this list. The Loess Letter map series published the Kriger 1965 map of loess distribution as its no.1 production, and reproduced the section on the history of loess studies as a Loess Letter Supplement (no.10 June 1986- for the INQUA 1987 Ottawa Congress).

12. Schultz & Frye 1968

C.Bertrand Schultz, John C.Frye; Loess and related eolian deposits of the World; University of Nebraska Press Lincoln 369p. [Proceedings of the 7th INQUA Congress, vol.12].

13. AFEQ 1969

AFEQ; La Stratigraphie des Loess d'Europe (Supplement au Bulletin de l'Association Francaise pour l'Etude du Quaternaire) CNRS-AFEQ Paris 176p.

AFEQ 1969. A bibliographic problem- which only concerns a tiny handful of loessic bibliographers. How shall AFEQ 1969 be described and classified? How can it sensibly be referred to? It needs to stay in view, it represents a critical moment in the history of the INQUA Loess Commission. It was produced for the Paris INQUA meeting of 1969 (8th) and distributed to delegates. The LL Archive contains two copies- those of Aart Brouwer of Leiden University and Claudio Vita-Finzi of University College London. How many were printed? 500? 1000? enough for each delegate to have a copy in their package of conference materials?

OCLC shows quite a good distribution in the world's libraries. It lacks a stipulated editor, and was not commercially published; well before the days of ISBN numbers- not mentioned in Pye (1987), published by CNRS, printed in Marseille.

AFEQ 1969 is Julius Fink's setting out of the plan of action for the INQUA Loess Commission. Before 1969 the Loess Commission was a Sub-Commission, it became a full Commission at the Paris Congress. The Loess Commission was Fink's vehicle- a setting for his vision of the development of loess stratigraphy in Europe- of the contribution of loess investigation to the development of Quaternary science in general.

14. Berg 1964

L.S.Berg; Loess as a product of Weathering and Soil Formation. Israel Program for Scientific Translations, Jerusalem 207p. Translated from Berg's autobiography 'Climate and Life'

Here is the Berg vision of the processes of loess formation- this is essentially the same view that Berg advanced in 1916; this is the 'in-situ' or 'pedological' theory of loess formation. It is a remarkable book; Berg was a remarkable scholar and he published his loess theory throughout his scholarly life, mostly in Russian. The best version, ironically enough, is probably this IPST version.

15. Smalley Benchmark 1975

Ian J.Smalley; Loess Lithology and Genesis [Benchmark Geology 26] Dowden Hutchinson & Ross Stroudsburg

It was Rhodes Fairbridge's idea- a series of books which would contain the basic, fundamental ideas in the geo-sciences- the 'Benchmark' series in geology. He proposed one on loess in the early 1970s, and, after some consultation it was produced as volume 26. Julius Fink, as President of the INQUA Loess Commission, participated in the discussion and proposed that the volume focus on matters sedimentological rather than stratigraphical. He felt that, at the time, there was too much muddle and confusion in the world of loess stratigraphy that the volume should focus on problems related to origin, nature and distribution; so the focus was 'Lithology & Genesis'

16. Smalley Partial Bibliography 1980

Ian J.Smalley; Loess A Partial Bibliography; GeoBooks(Elsevier) 103p. It is a partial bibliography in two senses; it is partial in the sense that it is not complete- no bibliography can ever be complete, and loess with the wide range of topics, locations and languages has no chance of being complete; and it is partial in that it reflects the interests and opinions of the compiler, who tries to be neutral and even-handed but is victim to his background and education and linguistic proclivities.

GeoBooks in Norwich produced a series of very well made but under-appreciated bibliography volumes, Loess was no.7 in the series. GeoBooks/GeoAbstracts did an excellent job, in pre-internet times, of keeping the geoscience community informed. The GeoAbstracts series was much admired and appreciated and, of course, vanished instantly when Eworld arrived.

17. Liu Tungsheng 1988

Liu Tungsheng (editor); Loess in China (Springer series in Physical Environment 5); China Ocean Press Beijing, Springer-Verlag Berlin 224p. ISBN 3-540-16717. The journal Progress in Physical Geography chose this book as a classic publication.

18. Pye 1987

Kenneth Pye; Aeolian Dust and Dust Deposits. Academic Press London, 334p. ISBN 0-12-568690-0. This is a very good snapshot of loess ground knowledge in the early 1980s.

19. Rozycki 1991

S.Z.Rozycki; Loess and Loess-like Deposits; Ossolineum Polish Academy of Sciences, 187p. ISBN 83-04-03745-9. The Polish language edition was published in 1986 by Studia Geologica Polonica. Copies donated to the Archive by Eric Robinson of University College London and Zdzislav Jary of the University of Wroclaw.

20. Trofimov 2001

V.T.Trofimov (editor); Loess Mantle of the Earth- and its Properties (in Russian); Moscow University Press 464p. ISBN 5-211-04336-7. The copy in the Archive was donated by Andrei Dodonov, who was a contributor. This book is essentially an updating and upgrading of Scheidig 1934; a large section on loess in general, followed by a section devoted to geotechnical aspects and engineering problems. Only 500 copies were printed. Reviewed in Engineering Geology vol.255, p.252.

London Stock Bricks in the Bazalgette sewers: inadvertent excellence? [speculative connections/ manifest virtues]

Over 300 million bricks were used in the construction of the Bazalgette sewer system for London. During the construction period there was a huge demand for bricks (and bricklayers) and the prices rose considerably. The obvious source of bricks was the multitude of brickworks around London all producing the London Stock brick- the classic brick made from the local brickearth.                                                                                                                                                                                                           

                                                                                                                                              

These bricks had certain properties and virtues- it appears that they were well suited for sewer construction. How many of Bazalgette's 300+ million bricks were London Stock bricks? It would seem logical that most of the Bazalgette bricks were London Stocks.

Was Bazalgette aware of all the excellent properties that LSB possessed and that made them specially suited for a complex drainage system, or did he take an 'overall' view of construction bricks and not distinguish with particular care among the various types- for such a careful engineer this latter approach seems unlikely?

It is possible to list a set of remarkable advantages that the LSB possessed; an excellent range of properties which has contributed to the success and longevity of the sewer system. The range of virtues is impressive: moulding and making virtues, strength virtues, dimensional virtues, chemical virtues, geographical virtues, etc..

Moulding and Making

The handmade brick is made in a mould. Each single brick is formed from brick material which is pressed into the mould by the moulder. He (invariably he) presses the material into the mould using the adequate and learned amount of force. This to some extent compacts the material and establishes the initial particle structure- a modest tensile strength develops as compression enhances particle contacts- the brick can now be handled and moved to a drying region. 

The BE(as ground material) has a packing density P of perhaps 0.5, which is a voids ratio e of 1.0. Half of the space is taken up by solid mineral material, half of the space is space. If BE is compacted (remoulded and then compacted)the P value rises to perhaps 0.6-0.7- and this P value stays relatively high even after firing. The actual density of a typical LSB is around 1845 kg/m3. The density of Q is about 2650 kg/m3- with a few assumptions (always a few assumptions) this gives a P value of around 0.7- still quite a lot of porosity in a fired brick. This allows combustion gases (from the dispersed spanish) to escape and gives the brick good drainage characteristics.

Strength

Structure: the essence of a loess/brickearth deposit is structure- the way that the constituent particles are arranged in the ground system. It is the open airfall structure of the deposit which causes the geotechnical problems with loess ground- when loaded and wetted the loess ground structure collapse; hydroconsolidation ensues, subsidence occurs. The metastable nature of the ground causes problems. It also allows easy digging. The man with the spade fares better in loess ground than in ordinary clay-rich ground which can be 'heavy' or 'sticky' and difficult to manipulate. The nature of loess ground means that thick loess deposits can be dug and successfully utilized. Easily dug and easily manipulated- ideal ground for the hand making of bricks; an open internal structure and not too much clay mineral content.

The particulate nature of loess/brickearth underpins all considerations of the development of properties in LS bricks. The ground nature is relatively complex but some chancy generalisations can be attempted. BE is a silty material; assume a mode size of around 30 um- and most of these particles will be quartz. The mode shape of the mode size Q particle can be calculated (with a few necessary assumptions: eg Q is isotropic). There is a probability approach to this problem, or it can be tackled via a very simple Monte Carlo method. If the particle shape is defined by the orthogonal box into which it just fits: the mode shape can be calculated to be about 8-5-2, these are the side ratios. It is a remarkably flat particle- it will eventually determine and dominate the internal structure of the LS brick- and provide its great strength when the particle contacts are emphasized and reinforced. The moulder produces a tight random packing of flattish particles in a cohesive plastic solid.

Dimensions

For a drainage tunnel it is useful to have the surface as smooth as possible- flow should not be impeded in any way. The accurately dimensional LSB allows careful smooth tunnel construction. The nature of BE allows for efficient filling of the brick mould and this ensures good dimensionality and sharp edges-good arris structure.

Chemistry and Mineralogy

The high Q content in the LSB gives it strength and abrasion resistance, and resistance to chemical erosion. The low clay mineral content (of not particularly clayey clays) allows relatively easy melting in the firing sequence. The eutectic in the SiO2-Al2O3 system is close to the silica end of the system; the components in the eutectic system are silica and mullite.

Location and Transportation

The geography is remarkable. The brickearth is on hand or very close to hand. The close to hand brickearth is connected by an efficient transport system directly to the site of the construction activity, and also serves to deliver supplementary fuel to the brick makers. The most significant brick construction in the world is to be emplaced at the heart of the brick universe; hard to imagine a more suitable location- a more apt location.

The problem (of building an extensive sewer system) arose at the centre of a great brick using universe; every fully laden Thames barge coming up from Sittingbourne delivered 50,000 bricks- to be able to use these to build the sewer system and to save the lives of Londoners was an amazing stroke of fortune. The LSB would appear to have been almost ideal for building a large and complex sewer system- so many aspects of its nature pointed to it being well suited to the job in hand.

Choice or chance?  The virtues of London Stock bricks for the construction of the Bazalgette sewer network in Lonfon (c.1860-1880).  Ian Smalley, Arya Assadi-Langroudi, Grenville Lill . British Brick Society Information 148, 10-19, September 2021.

Star Lane & Cherry Orchard Lane: Two brickworks in Essex

 Star Lane brickworks in Essex [TQ 935870]; Cherry Orchard Lane brickworks in Essex [TQ 857898]; south of the River Crouch, near Great Wakering, near Rochford; Brickearth deposits used to make London Stock bricks; among the longer lasting of the Thames Valley brickworks; owned at one time by D.&C. Rutter- who owned brickworks in Crayford. Both sites investigated by Grenville Lill in the 1970s; his TG studies on the London brickearths succeeded and amplified those of Freeman (1964). 

Lill, G.O. 1978.  The nature and distribution of loess in Britain. PhD thesis University of Leeds; etheses. whiterose.ac.uk

London Stock bricks

Alan Cox 1997.  A vital component: Stock bricks in Georgian London.  Construction History 13, 57-66.

The London Stock is a type of brick the manufacture of which is confined to London and south-eastern England (particularly Kent and Essex). It is made from superficial deposits of brickearth (Loess) overlying the London Clay, which are easily worked and produce a durable, generally well-burnt brick. This durability actually increases, since the London Stock brick has the fortuitous advantage of hardening with age and in reaction to the polluted London atmosphere..

Other characteristics of the London Stock result from its method of manufacture, two stages being especially important. The first of these is the practice of mixing the clay with what has been variously known as Spanish, soil, town ash, or rough stuff- that is London's domestic rubbish, which contained a large amount of ash and cinders. The addition of this sifted ash provided a built-in fuel when the bricks were fired..

I.L.Freeman 1964.  Mineralogy of ten British brick clays.  Clay Minerals Bulletin 5, 474-486. 

Sample 63AH; London Stock brick mixture; mainly Pleistocene from Kent.  75% brickearth, 10% estuarine mud, 10% washed chalk, 5% sifted town refuse. The chalk is added to produce the desired yellow colour. Freeman carried out thermogravimetric analysis on his brick clay samples using a Stanton Redcroft TR01 thermobalance.

The TG curve for 63AH suggests not much moisture loess at relatively low temperatures, this would be expected for a material with a relatively low clay mineral content. This is also reflected in the low weight loss at dehydroxylation temperatures. Greater weight loess occurs at higher temperatures where there may be decarbonation reactions from the chalk in the system. 62AK has larger weight losses at moisture loss temperatures and dehydroxylation temperatures indicating a larger clay mineral presence.

This is a very rough first-plotting of the DTG curve for the Freeman sample 63AH- the brickearth mixture. It shows two main thermal events (c.f. the DTA results above); four events can be tentatively identified: A the loss of adsorbed water- not very much water, not strongly held; B combustion of organic material, again not a great reaction, not a lot of organic material present; C clay mineral dehydroxylation, the classic clay mineral reaction, showing a modest amount of clay mineral material in the sample; D carbonate loss CaCO3 >  CaO +  CO2, the added chalk has an effect here, not a huge reaction, only a small % of chalk added. The whole 63AH DTG curve looks quite like the DTG curve for a Canadian quickclay; the dominant quartz of course offers no analytical signal.

For more on DTG applications see: Fordham, C.J., Smalley, I.J.  1983/4 High resolution derivative thermogravimetry of sensitive clays.  Clay Science 6, 73-79. 

Making bricks from Loess

 Large parts of London are made from loess. London grew in the 19th Century; thousands of houses were built with loess bricks- bricks made from the London Basin brickearth. London was well placed with respect to bricks; it could become the great brick-built city. The thousands of houses were all heated by open coal fires which produced vast amounts of ash and cinders- which was collected by 'dust-men' and concentrated into vast dust heaps. This could be sent by sailing barges to the downstream brickworks to be used in the making of the classic Thames 'stock' bricks.

Artist: Edward Henry Dixon 1822-1884.  The cows are grazing near Randall's Tile Yard, York Way (near Kings Cross) London. The triangular structures on the left are tile kilns, a typical tile kiln could be 70 feet high. They can be seen again in the drawing of the Somers Town dust heap (below), and in the York Way panorama.

The brickearth was universal in the Thames valley and there were brick and tile works all over London. Certain brick related locations have become well known via references in diaries and novels and other writings, and by representations by a range of artists. The most famous region is probably that at Battle Bridge, near the current Kings Cross Station, close to the old Smallpox Hospital (which appears in several E.H.Dixon pictures); close to Somers Town, at the southern end of York Way.

Signed EHD 1835. That is York Way; just off the bottom of the picture is the Regents Park Canal.

Charles Dickens last full length novel, Our Mutual Friend 1865, features a dust heap- the novel is based on the article 'Dust; or ugliness redeemed' by R.H.Horne 1850, which appeared in the journal Household Words (published by Dickens). The site of the Smallpox Hospital is now occupied by St.Pancras Station, adjacent to the British Library and Kings Cross Station and the Francis Crick Institute.  Nicodemus Boffin, the most agreeable character in Our Mutual Friend, lived near the great dust heap at Battle Bridge.

The building with the small dome is the Smallpox Hospital. This is the Great Dust Heap at Somers Town; this is the dust heap that was sold to Russia in 1848 for £40 000 to assist in the rebuilding of Moscow. Top right can be seen tileyard structures; local brick materials being produced.

This is Mr Boffin, his fortune is based on dust, his passion is for books. "Where I live, said Mr Boffin, is called The Bower.. up Maiden Lane, Battle Bridge, ask for Harmony Jail, and you'll be put right.."

Wegg looked into an enclosed space where certain tall dark mounds rose against the sky..."

E.H.Dixon 1837 appears to have produced two versions of this picture- of the great dust heap. This is the 'dark' version. Note the cloud of dust being raised by carpet beating. The other version, the 'light' version is reproduced in the previous blog. These dust heaps provided subsistence for a whole variety of people, who sorted the mixed materials into various useful sub-classes. R.H.Horne 1850 wrote of..

"..  the next sort of cinders, called the breeze because it is left after the wind has blown the finer cinders through an upright sieve, is sold to the brickmakers. "

For an excellent discussion of dust heaps and the story of the dust heap being sold to Russia see:

Cox,A., Hounsell, P., Kempsey,S., Kennett,D.H., Worthy, S. 2017.  London's dust mountains and bricks to rebuild Moscow after 1812.  British Brick Society Information 137, 9-34.

Questions about Brickearth

Two sets of questions: 1 historical & 2 scientific. Quite a lot of explanation required. The brickearth being considered is the brickearth found in south east England, particularly in south Essex and north Kent. This is what we now think of as brickearth. The Oxford English Dictionary OED (which will be our main etymological source) has a geological definition for brickearth/ brick earth:

brick earth n.  Earth or clay suitable for making bricks. Now chiefly in form brickearth. A fine grained silty deposit consisting of or derived from loess, occurring in the Thames basin and other parts of southern England. 

1816 W.Smith. Strata identified 11.  The Oak-tree clay also may be mistaken or confounded with the Brick earth, which in several parts produces good oak.

The famous early reference to brick-earth is that by John Evelyn the diarist, who in 1667 is involved in schemes to rebuild post-fire London in brick.

6 March 1667: I proposed to my Lord Chancellor, Monsieur Kiviet's undertaking to wharf the whole river of Thames, or quay, from the Temple to the Thames, as far as the fire destroyed, with brick, without piles, both lasting and ornamental.

26 March 1667: This afternoon I had audience of his Majesty, concerning the proposal I had made of building the quay...  Sir John Kiviet dined with me. We went to search for brick-earth, in order to a great undertaking. 

7 Sept.1667: Came Sir John Kiviet, to article with me about his brickwork.

2 April 1668: To the Royal Society, where I subscribed 50,000 bricks, towards building a college.

Evelyn lived in Deptford, on the south bank of the Thames, adjacent to Deptford Creek. He lived at Saye's Court, Deptford and it appears that he may have been planning to use local ground for his bricks.

14 Aug. 1668.  His Majesty was pleased to grant me a lease of a slip of ground out of Brick Close, to enlarge my fore-court, for which I now gave him thanks.

Actually the Evelyn brickmaking project does not go well (one suspects that Sir John Kiviet may have been less than trust-worthy) and another famous diarist comments on the endeavour:

Samuel Pepys 23 Sept 1668: At noon comes Mr Evelyn to me, about some business with the office, and there in discourse  tells me of his loss, to the value of £500, which he hath met with, in a late attempt of making of bricks upon an adventure with others, by which he presumed to have got a great deal of money; so that I see the most ingenious men may sometimes be mistaken. 

After the Great Fire of London there was a huge increase in brick production because it was ordered that London should be rebuilt from non-combustible materials. The Company of Tylers and Bricklayers had kept some control on the world of bricks but this proved impossible to maintain after the fire and widespread brick manufacture developed. And, of course, the fates had placed, in the Thames basin, a large amount of loess material (to become eventually known as brickearth) which could be turned into excellent bricks- assisted by a great post-fire discovery.  

Useful reference: T.P.Smith 2007. 'Upon an adventure with others' John Evelyn and brickmaking after the Great Fire of London. British Brick Society Information 103, 10-15.

According to the Company of Tylers and Bricklayers in 1714 it was not until after the failure of the Evelyn Deptford brickyard that a new method of brick masking was discovered.. Here one of our questions might be answered. When was it discovered that adding rubbish to the brickclay made brickmaking in Kent & Essex extra profitable? A virtuous network was established with a great and expanding city needing an endless supply of bricks connected by a convenient river to large deposits of ground material which proved ideal for brick making. And the city waste provided fuel for firing the bricks and enabled the transport barges to be loaded in both directions of travel. The discovery of the useful combustible admixture appears to have been made by accident.

" the practice of using ashes commonly called spanish (was) begun about forty years since [hence not until early 1670s] occasioned by diging up several fields contiguous to the city after the great fire which fields having been much dunged with ashes it was observed the bricks made with earth in those fields would be sufficiently burned with one half of the coles  commonly used. "

Why was the admixture called Spanish?  Here is one of the great brickearth questions. Loessic brickearth + Spanish makes fine bricks; but why is Spanish so-called?  And have our investigations exposed an error in the OED? 

OED 1714 London Gazette no.5209/4.  Together with two stools of Brick-Earth ready dug and spanished.

OED definition: etymology- of obscure origin; obsolete, rare. Earth or clay unfit for brickmaking.

This definition is wrong; it should read- rubbish or waste material added to brickearth to improve the efficiency of the firing process. OED suggests that Spanish is a bad thing but the opposite is true. Spanish is useful and virtuous in brickmaking with Thames brickearths (aka loess).

Daniel Defoe (yet another journal keeper of the time ; see in particular Journal of A Plague Year- not 2020 but 1665) casts a useful light on Spanish.

Daniel Defoe:  A brickmaker being hired by a Brewer to make some bricks for him at his country house, wrote to the brewer that he could not go forward unless he had two or three loads of Spanish, and that otherwise his bricks would cost him six or seven chaldrons of coals extraordinary, and the bricks would not be so good and hard neither by a great deal, when they were burnt

There ensues some misunderstanding because the brewer understands spanish to be liquorice juice.

Defoe was writing in 'The Complete English Tradesman'(1726) and he was making a point about clarity in communication. Chaldron was a volume measure, maybe about 32-36 bushels; Newcastle coal about 2850-2978 lbs; 1.309 cubic metres..

Defoe again:  the brickmakers all about London, do mix sea-coal ashes, or laystal-stuff, as we call it, with the clay of which they make bricks, and by that shift save eight chaldrons of coals out of eleven, in proportion to what other people use to burn them with, and these ashes they call spanish.

Laystal: a place where rubbish and dung are deposited. 

OED 1725 Act 12 Geo I c.35.  Several persons.. continue to make bricks of bad stuff and unsizeable dimensions, and do not well burn the same, and in making thereof mix greate quantities of soil called Spanish.  In other words too much Spanish and not enough brickearth, but the spanish properly used is a valuable ingredient. Spanish begins to be used after the great fire and contributes to the exploitation of the great brickearth deposits of Kent and Essex. And they were great deposits- hidden by history and industry were very large deposits of loess material which was used in the construction of a large brick city. Eventually brickearth will come to mean the deposits in Kent and Essex, and the loessic brickearth will come to be differentiated from brick clay in general.

The Smeed Dean brickworks in Kent was said to be the largest in the world; 60 million bricks were made in 1877. The loess deposits being exploited were of considerable size and thickness but because they had largely been mined away before loess science developed tended to be somewhat neglected and under-appreciated. These bricks were made with the aid of the added ashes and cinders, the spanish, and the history of the spanish could be a topic for further exploration. The ashes and cinders from houses all over London were collected into vast heaps and accumulations, and the trade in these materialsdependent on the brick making industry, provided a source of much economic activity. 

The last complete book by Charles Dickens, Our Mutual Friend 1865, relates largely to a large heap of spanish which serves to provide the monetary fortune for some of the protagonists. The picture by E.H.Dixon 1837 shows a large dust heap in the Kings Cross area.

 

Useful reference: Richard Hernry Horne 1850. Dust or ugliness redeemed.  Household words 1, 379-384.  The brickmakers at Uxbridge would contract for 15 or 16 thousand chalrdons of cinder-dust.. Brickmakers all around London relied on the constant supply of spanish and on the vast resources provided by the brickearth deposits.

Another dust heap picture; this time by C.H.Matthews

Questions 2: scientific

Where did all that brickearth/loess come from, and how was it emplaced? It appears that the story of the English loess is complicated and involves many steps and events.

The chart shows the route to the bricks. The chart (constructed by Colin Bunce) shows events and stages on the journey from the initial loess particles to the bricks made by Smeed Dean. It follows the old PTD (1966) scheme and indicates formation events, transportation events and deposition events (hence P, T and D). The D2 event puts loess all over SE England; subsequent events move this material about to give the deposits and concentrations that we observe. The large drainage basin is the Thames basin and material falling therein is eventually concentrated in the Kent and Essex brickearths. The Kent brickearth is augmented by material from the Medway basin.

Loess material in SE England; it has been suggested that it is the concentration of loess material in SE England that accounts for the concentration of brick buildings in SE England.

Useful reference: Smalley, I.J. 1986.  The nature of brickearth and the location of early brick buildings in England.  British Brick Society Information 41, 4-11.

William Whitaker in Plumstead (1889)

Whitaker, W.  1889.  The Geology of London and of Part of the Thames Valley (Explanation of Sheets 1, 2 and 3).  Memoirs of the Geological Survey. England and Wales vol.1 Descriptive Geology. London HMSO 556p.

On p.432 WW is in Plumstead in S.E.London (close to Erith and Crayford- the great depositories of brickearth aka loess).  He provides a sketch by 'my collegue Mr.Goodchild' showing brickearth in Plumstead.
This is the Goodchild sketch, redrawn and thus scale is meaningless but top to bottom of picture is about 20 feet (6m). details below

a. Loamy brickearth

b.  More clayey brickearth

c.  Broken up chalk

d.  undisturbed chalk

Loess Letter: the story of an INQUA newsletter

This is the story of Loess Letter, an INQUA newsletter which started life at the DSIR Soil Bureau in New Zealand in 1979 and was replaced in the new electronic world by the Loess Ground blog in 2015.  It is a story of adventure and romance- no its not its a tale of obsessive bibliography and the evolution of loessic studies at an interesting time in the development of Quaternary Research. Loess Letter has an ISSN number 0110-7658 and all the issues are available online at www.loessletter.msu.edu. Large efforts by Dr.Randall Schaetzl and dedicated helpers at Michigan State University have ensured online access to the complete oeuvre.

cover concatenation by Balazs Bradak

Its a tale of several parts; start at the NZ Soil Bureau in 1979; a newsletter for the Western Pacific Working Group of the INQUA Loess Commission. Issues 1-7 were produced by the Soil Bureau, printed by the NZ Government Printer in Wellington and distributed by the Bureau (1979-1982). Then a move to Canada, to the University of Waterloo in Ontario. Issues 8-16 from Waterloo, supported by NSERC (1982-1986). Then to the University of Leicester; issues 17-34, some initial support from the Royal Society (1987-1995). Issues  35-65 were produced at Nottingham Trent University (1996-2011, a mighty effort by NTU), and then the final sequence 66-72 back to Leicester University. The whole sequence was published online by Michigan State University and all issues can be accessed via www.loessletter.msu.edu. The transitions were 7 Ap 82 > 8 Oc 82; 16 Oc 86 > 17 Ap 87; 34 Oc95 > 35 Ap 96; 65 Ap 11 > 66 Oc 11; 72 Oc 14.

Loess Letter 1-10 was published as a compilation by Elsevier Geobooks in Norwich; ISBN 0 86094 218 X 1987. Very few copies were printed; if you come across a copy in your local second hand bookshop it will be a surprise (it may not be valued now as a rare book- but in the future: who knows?). OCLC only lists one copy in a library: in Technische Informationsbibliothek (TIB) Hannover 30167 Germany.

               title by Liu Tungsheng written at NZ Soil Bureau 1980

Supplements. A series of supplements was produced and given limited circulation. The supplements were initially produced as a contribution from the Loess Commission to the 12th INQUA Congress held in Ottawa in 1984. It was an erratic series of items, a few of which may have lasting value. A translation of the Pyaskovskii paper on deep soil formation which was produced at the Soil Bureau was eventually published as LLS 3, and in view of its significance again as LL72. The LL72 republication means that it is readily available online. Professor Edward Debyshire's inaugural lecture in the Geography Department at Leicester University on 28 April 1987 was published as LLS 21.
The most ambitious supplement, the most ambitious item in LL publishing history, was the reissue of John Hardcastles's Notes on the Geology of South Canterbury; originally published in 1908 by the Timaru Herald and republished, with editorial apparatus and maps, by LL in 2014 . The Hardcastle supplement was well circulated in NZ and reached a goodly distribution of universities and institutions (with assistance from the South Canterbury Museum).

The Supplements
1.  Loess & Agriculture. Kwong & Smalley. Oct.1983
2.  Dust mantles in Australia. A.J.Dare-Edwards
3.  B.V.Pyaskovskii, Loess as a deep-soil formation.  July 1989.
4.  The loess formation in Bulgaria
5.  The hydrogeology of loess 1883-1982
6.  Loess in Pleistocene soils on Mount Kenya. W.C.Mahaney
7.  Geotechnical investigations of loess in the USA. Alan Lutenegger et al.
8.  Lyell on Loess. A section from Principles of Geology 4th ed.1835
9.  Dokuchaev and the Russian approach
10. Kriger. A section from Kriger 1965 (in Russian)
11. Obruchev. A translation of the Obruchev article in Novi Mir- a popular account of loess
12. The Quaternary of the Great Hungarian Plain
13. Kriger again. This is the bibliography from Kriger 1965- the most important Cyrillic loess     bibliography available, critical for the study of historical Russian loess investigations.

14. Yeliseyev 1973 translated
15. Vaskovsky
16. Tutkovskii sampler
17. Kondratov's Arctic Lands
18. M.P.Lysenko
19. Pelisek
20. Seventy Books on Loess: March 1991
21. E.Derbyshire. The skin of the Earth and the way of the World
22. E.Derbyshire. Loess and the Argentinian Pampa.
23. John Hardcastle. 100 years of loess stratigraphy.

Hardcastle. Hardcastle as the pioneer of loess stratigraphy. John Hardcastle of Timaru as a significant pioneer of Quaternary Studies. LL supported JH- his bibliographical uncovering coincided exactly with the launch of the Western Pacific Working Group and his visibility has increased as loess stratigraphy has grown in extent and achievement. Supplement 23 was published for the 13th INQUA Congress in Beijing in 1991 and its widespread circulation placed JH nicely into a proper niche in geohistory. Supplement ns2 was published for the 19th Congress in Nagoya Japan in 2015-this was the climax of the LL/JH project- a republishing of his book Notes on the Geology of South Canterbury.

More on Marsigli

A Duna Folfedezese.  Luigi Ferdinando Marsigli,  Danubius Pannonico- Mysicus,  Tomus 1.
A Duna Magyarovszagi es Szerbiai Szakasza  (The Discovery of the Danube)  The Hungarian and Serbian sections of the Danube. ed. Antal Andras Deak (Budapest)
Vizugyi Muzeum.  Leveltar es Konyvgujtemeny.  Hydrographic Museum. Archives & Library 2004.
ISBN 9632-170334  pp.439. illus.  Euro 50-00.

review by Laszlo Grof:  Imago Mundi 58 (2) 231 only [2006].

Antal Andras Deak  [2012]
The mineral maps of L.F.Marsigli and the mystery of a mine map.  History of Cartography: International Symposium of the ICA 2012 ed. E.Liebenberg, P.Collier, Z.Gyoza Torok.

"This paper deals with the results of my research on Luigi Ferdinando Marsigli (1669-1730) as published in my books 'Discovery of the Danube' (Deak 2004) and 'Maps from under the shadow of the Crescent Moon'  (Deak 2006).  In the first I elaborated the history of L.F.Marsigli's Danube monograph (Marsigli 1726) and …"

Marsigli & Loess; The First Loess Section

Count Luigi Ferdinando Marsigli (1658-1730) published the first picture of loess in 1726..

This was figure 35 in the first volume of his great work on the Danube; Danubius Pannonico Mysicus. Observations made many years earlier but finally published in 1726 in six volumes. In volume 1 we have the picture of the Danubian loess; a section beside the River Danube. Its in the section of volume 1 called 'Hydrographicam', the critical picture is on page 63.
A:  Ripa terra fructifera pinguis nigra et cretacea (black fertile carbonate soil)
B:  Terra Nigra, Pinguis, Fructifera  (black fertile soil)
C:  Terra Lutosa, Cineriara et in fragmenta Cretacea friabilis (yellow layer with carbonate fragments aka Loess.)

This critical figure has been discussed by Markovic et al (2004, 2009)- and its significance pointed out. The redrafting of the Marsigli figure allowed the introduction of some small errors in the placement of the A, B and C symbols, and some confusion may have been caused.

Markovic, S.B., Kostic, N.S., Oches, E.A. 2004.  Paleosols in the Ruma loess section (Vojvodina, Serbia).  Revista Mexicana de Ciencias Geologicas 21, 79-87.

Markovic, S.B., Smalley, IJ., Hambach, U., Antoine, P.  2009.  Loess in the Danube region and surrounding provinces: the Marsigli memorial volume.  Quaternary International 198, 5-6.

Frontispiece to Volume one of 'Danubius Pannonico Mysicus' . Hydrological research is undertaken at a Danubian site near to UNS. (note: the attribution of this figure has been questioned ).

A Brace of Bibliographers

A brace of bibliographers: S.C.Stuntz (1911) and M.D.Warnock (1950). Stuntz on air-borne soils in general and Warnock on loess deposits in the USA.

OP 17  Harding, D.E., Smalley, I.J. 1988.  Warnock revisited: a bibliography of North American loess 1805-1955.  Leicester University Geography Department Occasional Paper 17, 66p.
This now has an OCLC number 20534913, and it always had an ISBN number; given as 870474 16 3 in the volume and appearing as 187047 4163 9781 8704 74160 online. This is essentially 'Bibliography on the Loess' by M.D.Warnock, published by the US Bureau of Reclamation in 1950; 403 references. Attention is drawn to 334 R.J.Russell on Lower Mississippi valley loess.

OP19 Smalley, I.J.  1991.  The First Great Loess Bibliography: Stuntz and Free - republished 1911-1991.  Leicester University Geography Department Occasional Paper 19, 93p. This is the bibliography from 'The Movement of Soil Material by the Wind' by E.E.Free, US Department of Agrculture Bureau of Soils Bulletin 68; the title page indicates a Bibliography of Eolian Geology by S,C.Stuntz and E.E.Free, but the bibliography is the work of S.C.Stuntz. And an amazing bibliography it is; it should be famous, celebrated, well-known- held up as an example of creative scientific bibliographies It should be admired and talked about. The good news is that it is readily available, OP19 may be difficult to get hold of but the entire Bulletin 68 is now readily available online thanks to Google Books, nicely presented, looks good on screen. Bulletin 68 has been reprinted by various 'print to order' publishers, perhaps the best known is Kessinger, although there are others:
Amazon offers Free & Stuntz 288p, Palala Press 2016, ISBN 10- 1357486065; OCLC 5718344, but the best news about the Stuntz bibliography is that it is available online, in good shape and at no cost.

Five Facilitators [in Loess Research]

Five facilitators:  Julius Fink, Marton Pecsi, Liu Tung sheng, Edward Derbyshire, Slobodan Markovic. Each one a considerable loess scholar in his own right but also a facilitator, an organiser, an enabler- someone pushing the whole field of loess scholarship by virtue of a great determination and a wealth of organising ability (and setting a great example).

Julius Fink (1918-1981) initiated organised loess activity. Perhaps a small condition should be attached to that statement. There was a moment of organisation which led to the American Journal of Science loess symposium in 1945, but that was transient and local. The real beginning can be placed at the 6th INQUA Congress, held in Poland in 1961. The sub-commission of loess stratigraphy of the Stratigraphy Commission of the International Union for Quaternary Research- was invented by Fink and the founding symposium was held at the 1961 INQUA Congress. He invited Liu Tung sheng and the paper presented by Liu, which showed multiple palaeosols in the Chinese loess, can be considered as the initiation of modern views of the Quaternary.

Marton Pecsi (1923-2003) is our second facilitator. He took over the presidency of the Loess Commission from Fink at the 10th INQUA Congress in Birmingham in 1977. The Sub-commission became a full Commission at the 8th Congress in 1969 (and stayed a full commission until INQUA was rebuilt in 2003). The Commission was a great achievement by Fink; it shaped and developed the study of loess and has provided a lasting influence. Julius Fink (1918-1981): first facilitator, organised what was really a relatively local enterprise; the focus was on east and central Europe and the tasks were fairly limited- essentially to investigate the loess stratigraphy of the region and to prepare a detailed loess map of Europe. Pecsi enlarged the aims; he wanted the commission to function on a world-wide basis and to expand the research focus. He proposed that geotechnical loess research should be pursued and that funding sources for loess investigation should be sought. He was president of the loess commission from 1977 to 1991. Early in his presidential period the Western Pacific Working Group was formed and organised loess study really did become worldwide. The WPWG was initiated by Jim Bowler of ANU Canberra and brought together scholars from China, Australia and New Zealand. This was at a time when Chinese scholars were just re-entering the world of science after the disturbances caused by the Cultural Revolution. The Loess Commission aided in the re-incorporation of Chinese science into world science. Issue 152/3 of Quaternary International is dedicated to Marton Pecsi and contains details of his life and career.

Liu Tung sheng (1917-2008). In 1991 the INQUA Congress (the 13th) was in Beijing; Liu Tung sheng was the Congress president and then president of the executive committee. He was a loess scholar par excellence and for many years led the Chinese loess research effort. He went to Australia in 1980 for the first of the WPWG field trips, and in 1987 was awarded an honorary doctorate by ANU Canberra. The Liu & Chang paper which he presented at the 1961 Congress in Poland could have been the most significant loess paper ever; it demonstrated the presence of multiple palaeosols in the Chinese loess- and therefore the succession of many cold and warm phases in the Quaternary period. The multi-event Quaternary was born. The handful of loess papers at the Fink symposium in 1961 became the cornucopia of loess papers at Beijing 1991. Liu led loess research to a glorious climax.(see Quaternary International 198: 2009)

Edward Derbyshire. 1999-the Great LoessFest in Heidelberg & Bonn. This was nominally organised by Edward Derbyshire, Ludwig Zoeller & Ian Smalley but ED was the main facilitator. LZ arranged the events on the ground but ED made this amazing event possible. People were enabled to attend who had never dreamt of attending such a meeting. Ed organised the research programme on the loess landslides in the Lanzhou region; he wrestled a large grant from the EU which made a huge contribution to furthering Chinese and European loess landslide research. He was briefly secretary of INQUA but did not find the task to his taste, but he was a remarkable facilitator in the world of loess research.(see Quaternary International 334/5: 2014).

Slobodan Markovic. 2006- the Marsigli Loess meeting; the focus restored to East/Central Europe. The emergence of Serbia as a leading loess nation, the move to prominence by the University of Novi Sad, a facilitator standing at the confluence of the Danube and the Tisza (and also at the confluence of the Danube and the Sava). The 2006 loess meeting in Novi Sad carried the momentum of loess research a significant step forward, it offered a new regional focus for loess research and demonstrated the real progress which had been accomplished towards Julius Fink's aims of loess study across central and eastern Europe. (see Quaternary International 198; 2009)

Danube 2018; Danube 1978

Lyell's Loess Legion; aka the Britz Brigade, the Mergel Mob

1833- the first edition of Principles of Geology..  Lyell lists the people he has had loess discussions with.. he acknowledged Leonhard, Bronn, Boue, Voltz, Steininger, Merian, Rozet, Hibbert.  These were the initial members of Lyell's Loess Legion. In later editions of PoG  Noeggerath, von Meyer & Horner. There were eventually eleven members- just enough for a cricket team. Some of these people are well known and have been incorporated into the loess story, but some have been neglected- we need more efforts to make sure that all are fully recognised. Some, like Steininger for example, were involved in the very early days of loess, the time of proto-loess, the time before loess was loess. Steininger wrote of 'britz'  one of the abandoned synonyms.. another was mergel; back in the days of the Britz Brigade, the Mergel Mob... There is a problem with Britz; Steininger was published in Old German text, in which tz is a joint letter. Some people write Briz. I favour Britz.. even Leonhard was confused.

this is Noeggerath; friend of Leonard Horner

and this is Ami Boue who was at Edinburgh University with Horner . Ami Boue (1794-1881) educated at the University of Edinburgh 1814-1817; Wollaston Medal winner 1847. According to Rozycki (1991,p.12) Boue (1836? 1838?) established the presence of loess in the drainage basin of the lower and middle Danube. Hibbert (in 1832) wrote "The latest tertiary deposit which appears to have characterised the valley from Mayence to Basle has been properly considered by M. Boue as the product of a great fresh water sea that filled the whole basin of the Upper Rhine. It has been described under various names, of which the one most adopted is Loess.                                                                                

Go South ! More Timaru pictures

The loess at Timaru in South Canterbury deserves more attention; we are doing our best to promote it. John Howarth has been taking some pictures in the neighbourhood..

John Hardcastle: Then (1890-1910) & Now (1980-2020)

Scientific palaeoclimatology was invented in the nineteenth century by John Hardcastle of Timaru. The exact moment was recorded by the Christchurch Star newspaper:

"An ordinary meeting of the Philososphical Institute of Canterbury was held in the Public Library last evening. There was a moderate attendance, the President, Mr.J.T.Meeson, in the chair...  The Secretary read a paper by Mr.J.Hardcastle of Timaru, on 'The Loess of Timaru as a Climate Register'. He stated his conclusion that the loess is a formation of wind-blown dust belonging to the second glacial period, and certain bands, which mark pauses in the process of deposition, are interpreted as registers of considerable variation of climate within that period.  [Christchurch Star 3 October 1890]

From his base in Timaru Hardcastle published much scientific material, mostly in the Timaru Herald, but his weightier material appeared in the pages of the Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute:

Hardcastle, J.  1889.  Origin of the loess deposit of the Timaru plateau.  Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute   22,  406-414.

Hardcastle, J.  1890.  On the Timaru loess as a climate register.  Transactions and Proccedings of the New Zealand Institute  23, 324-332.

Hardcastle, J.  1908.  Notes on the Geology of South Canterbury.  Timaru Herald ,Timaru 62p.
Reprinted as Loess Letter Supplement ns2, June 2014, Geography Department, Leicester University, with editorial material and maps.

That was then; now begins in  1979-1980 in the library of the New Zealand Soil Bureau, in Lower Hutt, New Zealand.  Jewel Davin and Ian Smalley are preparing a bibliography of New Zealand Loess to be published as a New Zealand Soil Bureau Bibliographic Report [BR28] by the Department of Scientific & Industrial Research. Almost exact dating is accomplished once again; John Hardcastle moves into their bibliographic awareness on 19 January 1979 as the library search encompasses the early volumes of the New Zealand Institute.  It was fairly apparent early on that JH was a significant person- he had made important observations, and he deserved some recognition. These early observations provided material for the JH section in BR28 (Smalley & Davin 1980 p.17). A few days after this first JH revelation the ANZAAS Conference opened in Auckland and the Western Pacific Working Group of the INQUA Loess Commission was properly founded.

Smalley, I.J. Davin, J.E.  1980.  The first hundred years- a historical bibliography of New Zealand loess 1878-1978.  New Zealand Soil Bureau Bibliographic Report 28, NZ Government Printer 166p.

Smalley, I.J.  1983.  John Hardcastle on glacier motion and glacial loess. [Early Discovers 33]  Journal of Glaciology 29, 480-484; reprinted in Loess Letter 71 www.loessletter.msu.edu

Fagg, R.  2001.  John Hardcastle (1847-1927)- a gifted amateur.  Geological Society of New Zealand Historical Studies Group Newsletter 22, 21-25.

Smalley, I.J, Jefferson, I., Dijkstra, T.A.,  Derbyshire, E.  2001.  Some major events in the development of the scientific study of loess.  Earth Science Reviews 54, 5-18.

Smalley, I.J., Fagg, R.  2014.  John Hardcastle looks at the Timaru loess; climatic signals are observed, and fragipans.  Quaternary International 372, 51-57.

Fagg, R., Smalley, I.J.  2018.  'Hardcastle Hollows' in loess landforms; closed depressions in aeolian landscapes- in a geoheritage context.  Open Geosciences 10,  58-63.

Fagg, R., Smalley, I.J.  2019.  Loess in New Zealand; observations by Haast, Hutton, Hardcastle, Wild and Speight 1878-1944.  Quaternary International 502A, 173-178.

Loess in South Canterbury

South Canterbury is in the South Island of New Zealand. It is the region which John Hardcastle wrote about in his book 'Notes on the Geology of South Canterbury'- first published by the Timaru Herald in 1908, and re-published in an edited and illustrated version by Loess Letter in 2014.  South Canterbury contains some interesting loess deposits; the Dashing Rocks section has been examined by many scholars and is probably the best known.  Most of the following illustrations are of the Dashing Rocks exposures. The loess there sits on the Timaru basalt- volcanic material from Mount Horrible which determined the location of the town of Timaru. The Dashing Rocks loess appears to contain three fragipans; is this the only occurrence of multiple fragipan horizons? Fragipans were first observed by Hardcastle in the Dashing Rocks loess.

Most of these pictures are by Roger Fagg of Timaru; a few maps etc included for locational purposes.  The soils at Timaru were eventually classified as 'fragic pallic soils' acknowledging the presence of fragipan horizons.

The John Bruce map of loess soils in the South Island.

John Howarth stands on the Timaru basalt