From the deep trench of Glen Mor - the Great Glen of Scotland - to the Highland Border, this guide describes the complex geology of the Grampian Highlands, an area which includes the highest peak in Britain, Ben Nevis. Considerable work in the region, carried out since the previous edition of this guide, has resulted in improvement in the understanding of the geology of the area.

This 4th edition of The Geology of Scotland is greatly expanded from the previous edition with 34 authors contributing to 20 chapters. A new format has been adopted to provide a different perspective on the geology of Scotland. A brief introduction is followed by a chapter outlining some of the important historical aspects that in the 19th century placed Scottish geologists in the forefront of a new science. Scotland is constructed from a number of terranes that finally combined in roughly their present positions prior to about 410 million years ago. Thus the geology of each terrane is described up the time of amalgamation, providing chapters on the Southern Uplands, Midland Valley, Highlands, Grampian and Hebridean terranes. At the end of this section, a brief synthesis summarizes the events that resulted in the amalgamation of the various terranes into the present configuration. Traditional practice is followed in the description of the Old Red Sandstone, Carboniferous, Permo-Trias, Jurassic, Cretaceous, tertiary and Quaternary strata. A separate chapter covers Tertiary igneous rocks. An attempt is made to tell the story of the geological evolution of Scotland, rather than catalogue all areas and formations. Priority is given to the onshore geology, encouraging the reader to go into the field and visit some of the world-class geology on show in Scotland. The chapters are broadly-based, attempting to integrate the sedimentary and igneous histories, and summarize changes in palaeogeography and palaeoenvironments. Economic aspects are covered with chapters on Metalliferous Minerals, Bulk Resources, Coal and Hydrocarbons. A new departure is the chapter on aspects of Environmental Geology and sustainability. Additionally, this publication contains a colour section of 32 plates, illustrating aspects of Scottish Geology, as well as a coloured geological map of Scotland.

Although a small country, Scotland’s geology is complex, internationally renowned and offers an accessible outdoor research laboratory and training ground for earth science. The onshore and offshore geology together encompass examples of all Earth’s geological periods and preserve many classic examples of sedimentary basins and orogenic belts. Palaeontological findings have provided key evidence for the evolution of life. With a wide spectrum of contributors, full-colour figures and photographs and, for each chapter, a Topic Box highlighting key research developments and challenges, this 5th edition of The Geology of Scotland represents a major update and expansion from the 4th edition. A revised Introduction summarizes the geological evolution of Scotland, the nature of the crust and the societal relevance of geology to climate change and sustainability. The final three chapters provide a modern view on energy, water and minerals, environmental concerns and geoconservation. The intervening chapters cover the geological periods, including much new geochronological data and exciting new palaeontological discoveries.

Since the first edition was published in 1983, this highly-regarded introductory textbook has been used by many generations of students worldwide. It is specifically tailored to the requirements of first or second year geology undergraduates. The third edition has been extensively revised and updated to include many new sections and over 50 new or redrawn illustrations. There are now over 220 illustrations, many incorporating a second colour to highlight essential features. The format has been changed to enhance the visual attractiveness of the book. The tripartite organization of the first and second editions has been modified by combining the purely descriptive or factual aspects of fault and fold structure in the earlier chapters with a simple treatment of mechanisms, leaving the more geometrically complex treatment until after the relevant sections on stress and strain, as before. Some subjects are introduced for the first time, e.g. inversion and orogen collapse, and others have been extensively modified, e.g. the chapter on gravity controlled structures now emphasises modern work on salt tectonics. The last third of the book is devoted to the wider context of geological structures and how they relate to plate tectonics. The final two chapters have been considerably expanded and give examples of various types of geological structures in their plate tectonic settings in both modern and ancient orogenic belts.

Although a small country, Scotland’s geology is complex, internationally renowned and offers an accessible outdoor research laboratory and training ground for earth science. The onshore and offshore geology together encompass examples of all Earth’s geological periods and preserve many classic examples of sedimentary basins and orogenic belts. Palaeontological findings have provided key evidence for the evolution of life. With a wide spectrum of contributors, full-colour figures and photographs and, for each chapter, a Topic Box highlighting key research developments and challenges, this 5th edition of The Geology of Scotland represents a major update and expansion from the 4th edition. A revised Introduction summarizes the geological evolution of Scotland, the nature of the crust and the societal relevance of geology to climate change and sustainability. The final three chapters provide a modern view on energy, water and minerals, environmental concerns and geoconservation. The intervening chapters cover the geological periods, including much new geochronological data and exciting new palaeontological discoveries.

With the new global tectonics approach in the Earth Sciences, the quan titative aspects of the dynamics of rock-forming processes came into focus: geologists are no longer satisfied knowing the pressure-tempera ture conditions of the formation of a metamorphic rock or of the emplace ment of a magmatic body, but instead would like to learn the time history of these rocks as well, i. e. , derive the temperature-pressure-time path and relate it to a tectonic process. To achieve this goal, a knowledge of both pressure-temperature-dependent equilibria and the time scales at which these equilibria may be attained are essential. However, the latter kinetic information is much more difficult to retrieve than that on equilibria: whereas equilibria are controlled by state variables, and proper laboratory experiments may be directly applied to equilibrium natural assemblages, kinetics also depends on factors other than state variables, such as grain size, dislocation density, and especially time (rate of heating, duration of annealing, rate of cooling). Extrapolation of kinetic data obtained at high temperatures on laboratory time scales to more realistic lower tempera tures and geological time scales are dangerous because, for example, of possible changes from an intrinsically controlled defect regime to an extrinsic one as temperature is lowered, or from an interface-controlled to a diffusion-controlled reaction mechanism.

The first full-length ethnographic study of its kind, Highland Homecomings examines the role of place, ancestry and territorial attachment in the context of a modern age characterized by mobility and rootlessness. With an interdisciplinary approach, speaking to current themes in anthropology, archaeology, history, historical geography, cultural studies, migration studies, tourism studies, Scottish studies, Paul Basu explores the journeys made to the Scottish Highlands and Islands to undertake genealogical research and seek out ancestral sites. Using an innovative methodological approach, Basu tracks journeys between imagined homelands and physical landscapes and argues that through these genealogical journeys, individuals are able to construct meaningful self-narratives from the ambiguities of their diasporic migrant histories, and recover their sense of home and self-identity. This is a significant contribution to popular and academic Scottish studies literature, particularly appealing to popular and academic audiences in USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Scotland