Rock Creep, Tidal Friction and the Moon's Ellipticities

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Abstract
A law of creep under long continued stress proposed by C. Lomnitz makes the displacement in time t increase like log ( at ) with a constant. It is found that this rule does not account simultaneously for the sharpness of seismic pulses and the damping of the variation of latitude, but they can be accounted for by a law that makes the creep in time t proportional to t0.17 . The modified law accounts easily for the rotations of Mercury and the satellites of the Earth and Mars. It is consistent with the existence of the Moon's excess ellipticities.