New Red Sandstone

Home > Earth and the Environment > Geology and Oceanography > Geology and Oceanography

New Red Sandstone The New Red Sandstone—or more simply the ‘New Red’—was recognized by the early geologists in Britain as a prominent post-Carboniferous formation. Thus it was separated from the lithologically similar Old Red Sandstone, which we now recognize as the continental facies of the Devonian. In north-east England, the New Red Sandstone can also be seen to rest on the (Permian) Magnesian Limestone; so it is equivalent to the red beds in Germany (the Germanic facies) which were incorporated into the Triassic system by Friedrich August von Alberti in 1834.

The Bunter, Muschelkalk, and Keuper Series of Germany are represented in Britain by non-marine red beds occurring in south-west England and South Wales, the English Midlands, and the Cheshire basin; on the eastern side of the Pennines from Nottingham to Durham; and in coastal parts of Scotland. At their thickest, in the Cheshire basin, they reach about 1500 m. In their upper parts there may be considerable layers of salt.

New Red Sandstone deposition was a continuation of the continental regime that followed the late Carboniferous earth movements. These movements deformed the area of the British Isles with thrusting and folding in south-west England and with uplift and faulting elsewhere. The new uplands were immediately subject to subaerial weathering and denudation, which persisted into the Mesozoic era. Thus, in Permian and Triassic times much of the British Isles was given over to local fault-bounded basins and intervening uplands. The climate was hot and arid and the drainage episodic. Early New Red Sandstone deposits include breccias and locally derived clays, and fluvial roundstone conglomerates. Thick variable sandstone and siltstone formations follow, overlapping progressively on to the margins of the original basins. They are in turn followed by monotonous red siltstones with evaporites, which have been correlated with the Keuper Series in Germany. These siltstones are topped by passage beds in the uppermost stage of the Triassic and marine strata of the basal Jurassic.

D. L. Dineley

Bibliography

Audley-Charles, M. G. (1992) Triassic. In Duff, P. McL. D. and Smith, A. J. (eds) Geology of England and Wales. Geological Society, London.
Sellwood, B. W. (1978) Triassic. In McKerrow, W. S. (ed.) The ecology of fossils. Duckworth, London.
Smith, D. B. (1992) Permian. In Duff, P. McL. D. and Smith, A. J. (eds) Geology of England and Wales. Geological Society, London.

New Red Sandstone name for the thick red layer of the Triassic formation in Great Britain (see Triassic period ). It is many thousands of feet thick and is composed chiefly of red sandstones, clays, and conglomerate; the red color and the occurrence of workable quantities of salt and gypsum suggest markedly arid conditions at the time of deposition.

New Red Sandstone Name given to the terrestrial red-bed deposits that overlie the Carboniferous. These deposits are of Permo-Triassic age.