Mapping college geology; history of building stone use in Cambridge

Add to your list(s) Download to your calendar using vCal

• Dr Nigel Woodcock, Earth Sciences Department of the University of Cambridge
• Monday 23 January 2023, 18:00-19:00
• Tilley Lecture Theater, Department of Earth Sciences.

If you have a question about this talk, please contact Buck Blake.

Have you ever looked at the geology on show in your own college, or in those you pass every day? Cambridge buildings, many of them in colleges or University sites, record nearly a millennium of stone use, probably the best record of any city in the UK.

A new survey of Cambridge buildings shows the predominance of limestones; 65% from the Jurassic Lincolnshire Limestone Formation, 10% from Jurassic units elsewhere in England and 19% from elsewhere, mostly the local Cretaceous Chalk Group. Another finding of the survey is that, until the completion of canal links to southwest England in 1815 and railway links across England in 1845, almost all Cambridge stone came from within 80 kilometres of the city. The talk will take an illustrated walk through the past millennium of stone use and identify other less obvious factors that have influenced the choice of stone, for instance the Black Death, the Wars of the Roses and the Dissolution of the Monasteries. We’ll also learn how to tell apart some of the superficially similar common limestones.

We’ll take examples from a wide range of colleges. However, if your college doesn’t feature, I’ll provide links to a newly revised guide to the geology of each college, as well as to more detailed accounts of building stone history in Cambridge. I’m also glad to take a geological walk with groups of you around your own college.

This talk is part of the Sedgwick Club talks series.

This talk is included in these lists:

• Department of Earth Sciences seminars
• Sedgwick Club talks
• Tilley Lecture Theater, Department of Earth Sciences

Note that ex-directory lists are not shown.