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Home » Physical Environment/Landscape » Natural history » Geology

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  • Colliers exhibiting a fragment from a fossilized tree found during coal mining.
Fossilized tree from Britannic Pit, Gilfach Goch
  • During the Permian Period (290-250 million years ago) most of the continental plates had merged to form one great super-continent called Pangaea. Wales was very close to the equator and hot, arid, desert conditions prevailed. All of Wales was above sea level, no sedimentary rocks were deposited, and therefore no Permian fossils occur in Wales. At the end of the Permian there occurred a massive extinction event, with over 85% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial life becoming extinct. It is likely that this was caused by a combination of factors, including volcanism, glaciation, change of sea-levels, and a possible meteor or comet impact. During the Permian Period, southern low latitudes were covered by dense forests of woody seed-plants, mainly trees, known as glossopterids. Different types of glossopterid tree produced different types of leaves, but the most commonly found were elongate with a strong midvein and meshed lateral veins, known as Glossopteris. Such leaves can be found in Permian rocks in South America, southern Africa, India, Australia and Antarctica, and was one of the main pieces of evidence to support the early claims for continental drift by the German scientist Alfred Wegener. During the Permian Period these areas were part of a single land mass known as Pangaea, which lasted for around 50 million years before breaking up.
Permian Period - Fossil: Composite of several Glossopteris, evidence of continental drift
Map of Monmouthshire divided into mineral and agricultural districts (coloured), by Charles Hassall, 1811
  • Henry Payne comments on stone found by Edward Llwyd when he visited the collieries in 1698.
'Parochial noticies of the deanery of the third part of Brecknock', by Henry Thomas Payne, 1806, page 199 [image 38 of 83]
  • On this page the author describes the geology, location and climate of Merthyr Tydfil.
Extract from 'The official directory hand-book and general postal guide for Merthyr Tydfil', 1873 [page 4 of 28]
  • Rocks and fossils dating from the Proterozoic Era.
Geology - the Proterozoic Era