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21 December 2018
Friday fold: Samaria Gorge, Crete II
The Friday fold is a guest submission from AGU’s new Chief Digital Officer, and shows a spectacular set of recumbent folds in Crete.
20 January 2015
Building stones of the Acropolis (Athens, Greece)
As a follow-up to my post about the geology of the Acropolis klippe in Athens, Greece, and in the spirit of my post on the building stones of the Haghia Sophia in Ä°stabul, Turkey, let’s turn our attention today to the various rocks that ancient Greeks used to construct the buildings of the Acropolis, such as the Parthenon. When we went to Greece in September, we didn’t just look at …
17 January 2015
Geology of the Acropolis (Athens, Greece)
When visiting Athens, Greece, you are drawn to the Parthenon’s grand architecture atop the hill called the Acropolis. But why is the Acropolis a hill?
11 November 2014
Santorini panorama
Here is the view north across the central caldera of Santorini, Greece: Click to enlarge to 9000 pixels wide This caldera formed during the Bronze Age, maybe as early as 1628 BCE or so, maybe as late as 1500 BCE. There are new volcanic islands rising in the center.
6 November 2014
Santorini ashfall and Akrotiri
Santorini is an island with nice exposures of the Tethyan subduction complex, yes. But did you know there’s also a volcano there? 🙂 Here’s a shot of some snorkelers, with a lovely stack of pyroclastics rising up behind them. Ash, lapilli, more ash — Santorini’s volcano has been very active over the years. This is a prodigious quantity of volcanic material. In the year 1627 BCE, the eruption of Santorini’s …
17 October 2014
Friday fold: Santorini schist
Happy Friday! Here’s some folded schistocity in the schist of Santorini’s Cycladean subduction complex: The blunt crest of the fold in the second photo appears to be a folded marble boudin. Neato!
16 October 2014
Boudinage in Santorini schist
While on my blueschist quest, I noticed this boudin train exposed in the trail. I’m not sure what exactly is being boudinaged here – only that it is lighter in color than the schist that surrounds it, as well as finer grained and less foliated (more massive). A tabular mass of fault gouge perhaps?
15 October 2014
In search of Santorini’s blueschist, part 2: finding fault
As mentioned last week, I took a solo field trip north of Perissa, Santorini, Greece, in search of subducted rocks. The contact between the two main rock types (marble and schist) was prominent and visible from a great distance (see photos in previous post), but what was the nature of this contact? Did it represent conformable stratigraphy? Was it a fault? Here’s a closer look at the contact: In places, …
9 October 2014
In search of Santorini’s blueschist, part 1: into the Valley of the Shadow of Ash
While in Santorini, Greece, your humble geoblogger braves a warm afternoon to search the hillsides for evidence of subduction.
3 October 2014
Friday fold: En route to Santorini over the Cyclades
A glimpse out an airplane window reveals some Cycladean geology in the Aegean Sea. Somewhere down there among the metamorphic rocks is our Friday fold… but nary a volcano in sight.
Callan Bentley is Associate Professor of Geology at Piedmont Virginia Community College in Charlottesville, Virginia. He is a Fellow of the Geological Society of America. For his work on this blog, the National Association of Geoscience Teachers recognized him with the James Shea Award. He has also won the Outstanding Faculty Award from the State Council on Higher Education in Virginia, and the Biggs Award for Excellence in Geoscience Teaching from the Geoscience Education Division of the Geological Society of America. In previous years, Callan served as a contributing editor at EARTH magazine, President of the Geological Society of Washington and President the Geo2YC division of NAGT.