The Paradoxidian Fauna of a Part of the Stockingford Shales

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Abstract
I. Introduction and Previous Literature. The strata which form the subject of this paper make up a small part of the Cambrian succession cropping out near Nuneaton, in the very heart of the Midlands. Here, an inlier of Cambrian age forms a narrow belt of country about 9 miles long, running in a general north-westerly and south-easterly direction, between the towns of Atherstone and Bedworth. On the north-eastern side lies the rolling plain of down-thrown Trias, while on the opposite, or south-western side, the highly-dipping Cambrian shales are unconformably overlain by the Coal Measures. In the early Geological Survey publication of 1859, by H. H. Howell, these lower strata were not differentiated from the overlying Carboniferous System. The Lower Cambrian Quartzites were correlated with the Millstone Grit Series, while the immediately overlying shales were included in the Coal-Measure Shales proper. The next noteworthy contribution was the brilliant work of Samuel Allport in 1879, on the intrusive igneous rocks. To these he applied the term ‘diorites,’ distinguishing them from the doleritic type that usually occurs in the Carboniferous of the Midlands. However, it was not until 1882 that Prof. Charles Lapworth and W. J. Harrison, noting the similarity of the quartzites of Lickey and Hartshill, investigated the area, and proved the bedded nature of the Lower Caldecote igneous rocks. Finally, by the discovery of Cambrian Lingulæ in the overlying shales at Stockingford Cutting, Prof. Lapworth was able to establish the true age of these beds. The same author divided the succession