The Triassic salt deposits of north-western England

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Abstract
A brief account is given of the present state of knowledge regarding the stratigraphy of the salt-fields in north-western England. It is stressed that salt solution has taken place on a considerable scale, and that old and shallow provings can be most misleading. Interpretations of the British Keuper as a desertic continental deposit have been based largely on condensed non-saliferous sequences. In contrast the evidence in the salt-fields is capable of being interpreted differently. It is contended (i) that the clastic and chemical rocks of the salt-fields were deposited beneath water; (ii) that this water is likely to have been deep; (iii) that it was in continuous contact with the open ocean across a shallow shelf area occupying much of west-central Europe. It is further contended that the importance of local factors in each salt basin so outweighed that of surface climatic fluctuations that it is unwise to assume that a particular salt formation in a particular basin necessarily correlates with a salt formation in another basin. Consequently it is argued that, away from the shelf-areas, no sound basis yet exists for long-range lithological correlations of the British Keuper.

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