Abstract
KELLAWAY has postulated1 an ice stream of Wolstonian (Saale) age moving from the Bristol Channel, across the lowlands of Somerset and into Wiltshire. He suggested that erratic rocks, including the “bluestones” from the Prescelly Hills of Pembrokeshire, subsequently erected in the Stonehenge monument, were carried into the chalk upland by this, or the earlier Anglian, ice sheet. At least one piece of the evidence he cites to support this hypothesis can be subjected immediately to critical examination. Kellaway described the Burtle Beds of Somerset in the following terms: “Other residual masses of glacial sand and gravel (‘Burtle Beds’) rise out of the marshes at Catcott Burtle, Weston Zoyland and Othery”. Their marine origin is cursorily dismissed in the phrase “These outwash deposits, previously thought of as marine....”. These deposits have, in fact, recently been the subject of detailed re-investigation2,3. This new work supports the conclusion by Bulleid and Jackson4,5 that the sands and gravels of the Burtle Beds are of marine origin. If that is the case then Kellaway's “glacial” hypothesis is much weakened. It is, therefore, important to review the grounds for re-asserting the marine character of the Burtle Beds.
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References
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KIDSON, C., HAYNES, J. Glaciation in the Somerset Levels: the Evidence of the Burtle Beds. Nature 239, 390–392 (1972). https://doi.org/10.1038/239390a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/239390a0
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