Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Volume 20, no. 12 - Softcover

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1885 Excerpt: ...stratigraphic observations, and constituted simply the sedimentary base, accordmg to the American expression. It was still without any characteristic fauna. But in 1844, Dr. Emmons having discovered in this formation fossils before unknown, his Taconic System for him represented the palceozoic base. "This expression, used on the other side of the Atlantic, is evidently equivalent to that of ' Primordial fauna,' which I have applied to the trilobitic group, the oldest of Bohemia, defined for the first time in my Notice preliminaire, in 1846. It is known that the Lingldce which characterize the corresponding horizon of Lingula flags in Wales, that is, in the Cambrian region of England, were only discovered by Mr. Davis in 1845. (Siluria, 2d ed., p. 43, 1859.) "In comparing these dates it is clear that Dr. Emmons had first announced the existence of a fauna anterior to that which had been established in the 'Silurian system' as characterizing the 'Lower Silurian' division, and which I have named Second fauna. It is then just to recognize this priority, and I think it all the more fitting to state it at this time, that it has not been claimed to this day." A more complete demonstration and justification of the priority of the " Taconic System," of its position at the base of all the systems of strata, and of the large place it holds in the stratigraphic scale, could not be desired. It is evident that, if Barrande had seen the memoirs of Emmons when they appeared, he would have used the name "Taconic" to designate all that lower part of the most ancient strata of Bohemia which, having nothing better, he called divisions A, B, and C of the "Lower Silurian." There is no doubt, also, that if Sedgwick and McCoy had publis...