The was officially announced as a UNESCO Global Geopark on Thursday 17 April 2025. Arran contains a variety of rock types and structures, vast archaeological and geological heritage, and an array of habitats that all make it a truly unique location. The island has a diverse range of plants and animals that benefit from the landscape and underlying geology, which means that Scotland ‘big five’ — golden eagles, red deer, red squirrels, otters and harbour seals — are well established.

±«±··¡³§°ä°¿&²Ô²ú²õ±è; are areas with internationally important landscapes and rocks, all of which are managed responsibly for conservation, education and sustainable development. Although geology is their foundation, Global Geoparks also bring together other aspects of heritage such as archaeology, history, culture and biodiversity. Collaboration with local people makes the Global Geoparks better places to work, live and visit.

51ÁÔÆæ contributes to the development of UNESCO Global Geoparks through the UK Committee for UNESCO Global Geoparks, which is responsible for coordinating Global Geoparks at a national level, and the submission of UK candidates for UNESCO Global Geopark designation. BGS is also able to provide geological information, such as and photos.

There are now 229 UNESCO Global Geoparks in 50 countries, 10 of which are located in the UK, including the Isle of Arran. Two other Global Geoparks in Scotland are the North-west Highlands and Shetland.  Other UK Global Geoparks include the Black Country in the West Midlands of England, Fforest Fawr in south Wales, Cuilcagh Lakelands Geopark in Northern Ireland.

Through my role as Chair of the UK Committee for UNESCO Global Geoparks, I mentor aspiring UNESCO Global Geoparks in the UK and have worked with the Isle of Arran over the past four years to develop its application.

Arran is truly special in terms of its geology, archaeology and habitats, and we are delighted that this has been recognised and that the island has been named as a UNESCO Global Geopark. Congratulations to all those involved.

Dr Kirstin Lemon, science programme manager at the Geological Survey of Northern Ireland and Chair of the UK Committee for UNESCO Global Geoparks.

The geology of Arran is truly special. Features of the island include folded rocks from ancient Caledonian mountains, red desert sandstone, footprints of extinct reptiles, and a great variety of dykes, sills and intrusions, formed when the Atlantic Ocean opened. It was at Arran that James Hutton, the ‘father of modern geology’, found the first example of an unconformity, now one of three Hutton unconformities. The granites of Goat Fell, Cir Mhòr and Beinn Tarsuinn are sculpted into intriguing shapes by ice, wind and water, and bear some of the finest rock-climbing routes in Scotland. I congratulate the local community for their hard work making Arran a UNESCO Global Geopark.

Dr Maarten Krabbendam, BGS Chief Geologist, Scotland.

 

October 2023 saw BGS National Geological Repository (NGR) welcome two UK-based artists who were visiting the collections as part of their individual projects focused on the Blackwater Estuary in Essex. Nastassja Simenski and Angenita Teekens visited the repository to view core samples from around Bradwell A, a Magnox-design nuclear power station located on the Dengie peninsula at the mouth of the River Blackwater in Essex. The power station has been in long-term decommissioned management since 2019.  

The landscape of the Blackwater Estuary

Nastassja Simenski, artist and researcher at University College London, is studying for her PhD on the potential of collaborative fieldwork between artists and archaeologists. She is particularly focused on how the development of place-specific and collaborative methods ‘in the field’ enable new ways of highlighting current conversations around energy production in the Blackwater Estuary.  

Visiting the BGS repository and seeing the core samples from the Bradwell and Blackwater Estuary helped me to get a sense of how the geology of the area has shaped the landscape over time and, in turn, impacted the types of human production and interaction here over long durations […] for instance, the core samples from Bradwell are a starting point from which we can think about how a seemingly remote part of the Essex coast is implicated in wider contexts like managed realignment and climate change mitigation, agricultural policy, natural and cultural heritage, and the development of new forms of energy production.

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Nastassja Simenski

Natassja research includes place-based art practices and considers how specific scientific research and data such as BGS core samples can be used creatively to tell bigger stories that move across long time periods and wider geographies. The issues explored in her research are mediated through art including the potential to use data, historical records and interviews to inform musical scores, live performances and films that get shown in situ or in galleries, broadcast on radio and screened at film festivals. Natassja research includes place-based art practices and considers how specific scientific research and data such as BGS core samples can be used creatively to tell bigger stories that move across long time periods and wider geographies. The issues explored in her research are mediated through art including the potential to use data, historical records and interviews to inform musical scores, live performances and films that get shown in situ or in galleries, broadcast on radio and screened at film festivals. 

Earthworks: boreholes and dorodangos 

is an established artist with 25 years of experience in facilitating environmental community art projects. Her most recent project, ‘Earthworks’, is a community inquiry about bore samples, extraction, disposal and the energy transition. The project will see members of the Othona community, as well as community groups in Essex, creating 260 dorodangos, which will be twinned with bore samples taken from fields adjacent to Bradwell, which are currently stored at BGS.

The Japanese dorodango artform consists of a small sample of clay rolled into a sphere by human hands within human time, as part of a slow meditative practice.  

Accessing the BGS collections is a vital source of information for the creation of a borehole catalogue as part of Angenita project. The inclusion of visual materials such as borehole logs, along with sketches, drawings and writing, will help to guide participants in their creation of the dorodangos, whilst questioning land use, energy production, geological and human time and human impact on land. 

The National Geological Repository at BGS

The National Geological Repository (NGR) is a  and the largest collection of geoscience samples from the UK. It forms an integral part of BGS (part of 51ÁÔÆæ ) and is located at the BGS headquarters in Nottinghamshire. 

NGR unique collections are used extensively by industry, in research and to support university teaching. It has the UK largest core storage and examination facility, with the Core Store and records collections at its centre. The collections include: 

• borehole cores and samples 
• fossils, rocks and other samples 
• related subsurface information from the UK landmass and continental shelf 

About the artists

 

I have recently returned from a couple of weeks of fieldwork on Mount St Helens volcano in the Cascades, US, with Julia Eychenne from Laboratoire Magmas et Volcans (LMV) Volcanology, France and David Damby from the United States Geological Survey, and in collaboration with the Cascades Volcano Obervatory. The focus of our fieldwork was the , which produced the largest debris avalanche in recorded history as much of the northern flank of the volcano was removed. This avalanche led to a powerful blast which stripped much of the surrounding area of trees and produced a plume of ash that lofted to more than 30 km above sea level. Ash was dispersed many hundreds of kilometres away from the volcano. Plinian plumes, pyroclastic density currents and lahars (mixtures of volcanic material and water) followed and continued over the following months.

Given the scale and the range of eruptive behaviour that occurred during this eruption, it presents a case study that enables scientific investigation from a range of perspectives. Across our field team, interests ranged from eruption dynamics, human health impacts and ash resuspension. We dug holes through the deposits to allow us to access the whole sequence of the eruption, collecting blast samples and ash deposits from several locations across the blast area.

While we initially focused on the 18 May 1980 blast deposits, a day in the field with Cascades Volcano Observatory scientist Heather Wright introduced us to deposits from several older eruptions from Mount St Helens which also piqued our interest.

Over the coming months, the team will conduct geophysical and chemical analyses to improve understanding of the deposits, providing further insights into the eruption.

The fieldwork was made possible through collaboration with Cascades Volcano Observatory. Many thanks to Alexa Van Eaton, Heather Wright and Richard Waitt for providing lots of context on the eruption, deposits and field relationships, and ensuring we had a great trip!

About author

Throughout history, natural stone has been the material of choice for Scotland traditional and architecturally important buildings. The geological diversity of the country means the built heritage is unique and varied from place to place. 

Since 1835, BGS geologists have been collecting samples from building stone quarries all over the country and, in partnership with Historic Environment Scotland, we have just completed a major effort to photograph them. We hold over one thousand samples in the BGS Building Stone Collection; the images have been published on the and websites.Ìý

The photos highlight the diversity of stone as a traditional building material in Scotland. Can you spot which stone your house, favourite building or local area is made from? 

We hope the database will be a useful resource for anyone studying or working on stone buildings in Scotland. If you’re interested in learning more about the project, please contact the building stones database team (stonedatabase@bgs.ac.uk).  

Timeline of Scottish building stones

Further information 

• The Engine Shed: Scotland’s Building Conservation Centre   
•  

History of the stone

The Stone of Scone (pronounced ‘skoon’), also known as the Stone of Destiny or, in England, the Coronation Stone, is a slab of sandstone upon which the monarchs of Scotland have been crowned since medieval times. Stories about its origin are shrouded in mystery; one says it is the Biblical Jacob Pillow; another has it being used by ancient tribes of Scots in County Antrim before being brought to Scotland and still another states it originally came from the Roman Antonine Wall.

What is known is that it was used as a crowning-seat for Scottish monarchs at Scone Palace in Perthshire between the 9th and 13th centuries, until it was stolen in 1296 by King Edward I of England, the ‘Hammer of the Scots’. He took the stone to Westminster in London and had it mounted in a wooden throne; since then, English monarchs would be crowned above the stone as a symbol of the dominion they claimed to have over Scotland. It was not returned to its homeland until 1996, where it now resides in Edinburgh Castle.

The Stone of Scone at BGS

The stories and myths around the Stone of Scone are well known, but what is less well known is that fact that BGS has a sample of it as part of its Scottish collections. According to BGS records, the sample was collected in the late 19th century by either Sir A C Ramsay or Sir J J H Teall, both of whom later became directors of the Geological Survey of Great Britain (now the 51ÁÔÆæ).

The entry in BGS collections register corresponds to this sample and an additional six microscope slides, labelled S17850 to S17855, and refers to them rather irreverently as ‘crumbs from the Stone of Scone’. The entry for sample S17855 states that it was added to the collection by Teall, with the clear implication that this applies to the other thin sections and the rock chips. These microscope slides may, collectively, be samples collected by Ramsay in 1865 and were later registered by Teall as part of BGS Scottish collection. Ramsay examined the stone in Westminster Abbey and described how he took a sample by sweeping its lower surface with a soft brush, detaching as many grains ‘as would cover a sixpence’.

The grain mount thin sections made from Ramsay samples were later examined by another BGS geologist, C F Davidson, in 1937. Davidson stated that the ‘microscopic preparations’ were obtained in 1892. It is possible that he confused the year in which the samples were registered (possibly 1892) with that in which they were originally collected (1865). The additional loose rock chips may have been collected separately, perhaps in 1892 by Teall, and given the same sample number as one of the original microscope slides.

The samples held by BGS are of a pale-pink sandstone that is lithologically similar to the Stone of Scone. Detailed analysis of the microscope slides in 1998 and the actual stone on its return to Scotland confirmed that it resembles the Lower Devonian sandstones from the Perth area. In particular, the texture, mineral assemblage and colour are similar to the Devonian sandstones of the that are exposed in the vicinity of Quarry Mill, near Scone Palace.

Is this the real Stone of Scone?

There has always been a question as to whether the stone now used in the coronation ceremony is the original, ‘real’ Stone of Scone. It was rumoured that the monks who guarded the stone at Scone Palace gave the English king a fake and that this is the stone that now sits in Edinburgh Castle. The stone was also stolen from Westminster Abbey in 1950 by a group of Scottish students, who hid it until 1951 when they handed themselves in and revealed the stone location. Rumours abounded again that they had returned a fake and that the real stone remains hidden away, adding another chapter to the stone mysterious history.

Is the Stone of Destiny upside down?

Examination of the Stone of Scone reveals that it is a single bed of cross-laminated sandstone. The cross-lamination was formed by sand waves moving across the bed of an ancient Devonian river that once flowed across central Scotland. The curved shapes of the sedimentary structures shows that the smooth, upper surface of the stone was the original base of the sandstone bed and the ‘base’ of the stone, which has been left uneven and unworked, is the irregular top of the sandstone bed. Geologically speaking, the Stone of Destiny is indeed ‘upside down’, possibly because the base of the sandstone bed was smoother and much easier for the original stone mason to work to provide the required flat surface.

The coronation of King Charles III

In May 2023 the Stone of Scone will once again travel south to Westminster, where it will be installed in the coronation chair that King Charles III will sit in when he is crowned in Westminster Abbey. After this it will return to Scotland once more to await the coronation of the next monarch of the United Kingdom.

About the authors

The adrenalin, the attacks, the climbs, sprints, chases and, for some, the incredible victories, would arguably not be such a spectacle were it not for Britain incredibly diverse geology.

Though the link is rarely made, the geology beneath our feet is ultimately responsible for shaping our landscape today, even shaping our Strava segments.

Our rich variety of landscapes, largely consisting of Triassic, Jurassic, Cretaceous and Tertiary strata, has paved the way to victory for the world greatest cyclists across mountains, countryside and coastline for decades.

This year edition in 2022 is set to be no different, with eight days of racing from the iconic ‘granite city’ of Aberdeen in Scotland to the distinctive chalk stacks of the Needles on the Isle of Wight. 

But why are some stages of this year Tour hillier than others? It ultimately determined by the rocks and sediments of an area and the subsequent geological processes that have been eroding, folding or faulting them over the hundreds of millions of years since they were deposited.

Here we take a closer look at some of the rocks behind the race.   

The materials that make a bike

It not only our landscapes that are influenced by geological processes; our equipment is too. Since lightweight carbon fibre began to dominate the performance cycling world nearly two decades ago, races like the Tour of Britain have featured even lighter, stiffer and more impressive bikes and designs. 

Many of the components found on a racing bike require materials derived from the ground beneath our feet. In case you’re wondering, here are the basic materials required and some are more obscure than you might think:

So if, like us, you’re thinking about exploring Britain fascinating geological wonders on a bike, why not take a moment to appreciate the world beneath your wheels and the geological conditions that influence your next cycling adventure.

Geologists have found the fossil of the earliest known animal predator. The 560-million-year-old specimen is the first of its kind, but it is related to the group that includes corals, jellyfish and anemones living on the planet today.

The palaeontologists who discovered it have named it ‘Auroralumina attenboroughii‘ in honour of Sir David Attenborough. The first part of its name is Latin for ‘dawn lantern’, in recognition of its great age and resemblance to a burning torch.

It was found in Charnwood Forest, near Leicester in England, which is famous for its fossils. In 1957, a fern-like impression in stone turned out to be one of the oldest fossilised animals, Charnia masoni.

Sir David Attenborough  ‘truly delighted’ with his new namesake

When I was at school in Leicester I was an ardent fossil hunter. The rocks in which Auroralumina has now been discovered were then considered to be so ancient that they dated from long before life began on the planet. So I never looked for fossils there.

A few years later a boy from my school found one and proved the experts wrong. He was rewarded by his name being given to his discovery. Now I have — almost — caught up with him and I am truly delighted.

Sir David Attenborough.

Sir David is referring to Roger Mason, after whom Charnia masoni was named.

When did modern groups appear?

The discovery of Auroralumina, reported in, throws into question when modern groups of animals appeared on Earth. Dr Phil Wilby, palaeontology lead at BGS, is one of the scientists who made the find.

It generally held that modern animal groups like jellyfish appeared 540 million years ago, in the Cambrian Explosion, but this predator predates that by 20 million years.

It the earliest creature we know of to have a skeleton. So far we’ve only found one, but it massively exciting to know there must be others out there, holding the key to when complex life began on Earth.

Dr Phil Wilby, BGS Palaeontology Lead.

When and where was it found?

Palaeontologists still flock to the forest to examine its Ediacaran Period fossils, aged between 635 and 538.8 million years. In 2007, Phil Wilby and others from BGS spent over a week cleaning a 100 m-square rock surface with toothbrushes and pressure jets. They took a rubber mould of the whole surface and captured the impression of over 1000 fossils — and one stood out from the crowd.

Dr Frankie Dunn from the Oxford University Museum of Natural History carried out the detailed study.

This is very different to the other fossils in Charnwood Forest and around the world.

Most other fossils from this time have extinct body plans and it not clear how they are related to living animals. This one clearly has a skeleton, with densely packed tentacles that would have waved around in the water capturing passing food, much like corals and sea anemones do today.

It nothing like anything else we’ve found in the fossil record at the time.

Dr Frankie Dunn, Oxford University Museum of Natural History.

Dunn calls the specimen a ‘lonely little fossil’ and thinks it originated from shallower water than the rest of the fossils found in Charnwood.

The ancient rocks in Charnwood closely resemble ones deposited in the deep ocean on the flanks of volcanic islands, much like at the base of Montserrat in the Caribbean today.

All of the fossils on the cleaned rock surface were anchored to the sea floor and were knocked over in the same direction by a deluge of volcanic ash sweeping down the submerged foot of the volcano, except one: A. attenboroughii.

It lies at an odd angle and has lost its base, so appears to have been swept down the slope in the deluge.

Dr Frankie Dunn.

A. attenboroughii was dated at BGS headquarters in Keyworth, Nottingham, using zircons in the surrounding rock. Zircon is a tiny radioactive mineral that acts as a geological clock: it assesses how much uranium and lead are present. From that, geologists can determine precisely how old the rock is.

The ‘Cambrian Explosion’ was remarkable. It known as the time when the anatomy of living animal groups was fixed for the next half a billion years.

Our discovery shows that the body plan of the cnidarians [corals; jellyfish; sea anemones, etc.] was fixed at least 20 million years before this, so it hugely exciting and raises many more questions.

Dr Frankie Dunn.

Mary Anning is known as one of the most celebrated fossil hunters in the UK. Her pioneering work was undertaken around the Jurassic Coast in Dorset, where she found, amongst many others, ichthyosaur, pterosaur and plesiosaur fossils. Here, BGS Conservator, Simon Harris, talks us through a letter from Anning, sent in 1822, and what this letter can tell us about her life and work at the time.

Transcript

Dear Madam

I cannot give you a correct account of the fossills found in the neighbourhood Lyme has I dont know any thing of shells, but I will write down the names of all those fossils that I can reccolect.

Blue Lias, Ichthyosarus vulgaris, Icthyosarus platydon Tenuirostis, Plesiosarus, dorsal fins resembling the radie of Balistis, dapedium politum, fragments of three other distinct species of fish, Crustacions insects, vegetable impressions, pentacrenite, a variety of Amonites, Natulis, Belemnites, palates of fish Wood, and almost every kind of shell, Iron pyrites, barytes, Calcarious spars, Cupids wings, green sand, Lobsters, cray fish, crabs, teeth, fern Echinets, wood, a variety of fossil shells, gupsum selenite Chalk, teeth, palates, vertebral colums of pentacrenite four kinds of Echinetes, a greate variety of shells madrepore’s, Alceoniums,Terabratulae Pectens

Alluvium, tusks of the mammoth, teeth of the Rehinocerus, teeth of a species of Bullock, flints Chalcedony agates, jaspers, wood echinetes, alceonium a variety of shells Amonites,

I have included all the fossils found between Charmouth, and Axmouth,

I am very sorry to hear your journey to Exeter, has been of so little service to you, I fear you will not be better till the spring, as I cannot think this usesonable weather is good for invalids, I am greatly obliged to you for your kind present, and also for your kind intentions of speaking to your doctor but I was too ill to undertake the journey, it seems an age since I had the pleasure of seeing you, I fear you will not be able to reade this horrid scrall, I can scarcely hold any pen everything seems an exertion

I remain dear madam your
obliged servant
Mary Anning

Mary Anning
Collector of Fossils
Lyme Regis

The subscription was written by Mrs Robt. Kennaway of Charmouth Dorsetshire, to whom this letter was addresses in the year 1822.- and who herself is a scientific geologist, and collector of fossils.
J.H.S.

 

 

This is a fascinating letter. Although we do not have the letter which prompted this response, it clearly answers the question which thousands of visitors to the Jurassic Coast ask to this very day, namely: ‘What fossils can I find here?’

Even in her early twenties, Mary Anning demonstrates in her letter a thorough knowledge of the rocks between Axmouth and Charmouth, around a 10 mile stretch of coast with Lyme Regis at its centre, which probably represents the furthest she would have been able to walk in a day, not having access to any other form of transport.

In the letter, she correctly and concisely lists fossils that would be familiar to collectors today:

• the three most common species of ichthyosaur found, Ichthyosaurus vulgaris (now called I. communis), I. platyodon, and I. tenuirostris
• the Plesiosaurus, which was at that point still very new to science — in 1823 Anning would discover a spectacular complete specimen, which would enable the full description of Plesiosaurus dolichodeirus to be completed by William Conybeare
• the existence of at least four different kinds of fish
• much of the invertebrate fauna, including the ever-present ammonites, belemnites and crinoids (‘pentacrenite’, known today as Pentacrinus)
• the presence of wood and vegetable impressions (probably leaf impressions, which are found occasionally), which indicate that there was land not very far away from where the fossils were being formed

She is also aware that certain fossils are found in certain rocks, and not in others, demonstrating an underlying knowledge of the local stratigraphy.

Anning uses scientific terms wherever possible and, where not, tries to draw on the similarities with modern species with which she is familiar through her limited access to books and scientific papers, which we know she sometimes was able to borrow and would labouriously copy out by hand. For example ‘dorsal fins resembling the radie of the Balistis’ may refer to the modern Balistes, a triggerfish. The fossils themselves may be the rarely found spines of cartilaginous shark species; later she would discover remains in the rocks near Lyme Regis that would permit a fuller description of these fossils.

We see relatively few uses of folklore terminology for fossils despite the fact that, at this time, use of these descriptions to explain the strange anomalies found in the rocks would have been commonplace. Think, for example, of the terms nakestone‘ to describe ammonites, ea dragons‘ for marine reptiles, ‘Cupid’s wings’, possibly referring to some species of bivalve or brachiopod shell, or ’fairy loaves‘ for sea urchins. This demonstrates that Anning had built an impressive scientific understanding of her finds, even without access to the level of formal education held by the men of science with whom she would correspond.

There are very few notable omissions from Anning list, but one to mention is of ’bezoar stones‘ or as we now call them, coprolites (fossil faeces). We know that it wasn’t until 1824 that Anning began to make the connection between these unusually shaped stones and the animals that made them, although it is probable that she had encountered them many years before.

This letter still stands as a remarkably complete account of fossils that are found around Lyme Regis to this very day. If you were to ask a local collector the same question today, you would receive an answer that was not very much different! It shows us that Mary Anning was an extremely skilled and knowledgeable fossil collector, who made every effort to learn as much about the things she was collecting as she possibly could.

About the author