Abstract Heritage stones are stones that have special significance in human culture. The papers in this volume discuss a wide variety of such stones, including stones from Europe, Asia, North and South America, Africa and Australia. Igneous (basalt, porphyry and a variety of granites), sedimentary (sandstone, limestone) and metamorphic (marble, quartzite, gneiss, slate, soapstone) stones are featured. These stones have been used over long periods of time for a wide range of uses, including monuments, buildings of architectural note, columns, roofing, tiling and lithography. A number of papers in this book provide information that is essential for eventual approval of stones as a Global Heritage Stone Resource or a group of stones as a Global Heritage Stone Province.

Abstract Trentino Porphyry is an igneous rock composed of rhyolitic–rhyodacitic ignimbrites. It belongs to the Athesian Volcanic Group, a widespread calc-alkaline magmatic association of Lower Permian age (280–270 Ma) occurring in the Trentino-Alto Adige region, north Italy. Extraction and processing are currently carried out in Trento Province, particularly in the region of Cembra Valley and its surroundings. Initially introduced for road setts throughout Trentino and Südtirol, Trentino Porphyry has progressively become one of the most important materials for paving and facing in Europe and all over the world, where it is appreciated and renowned for its durability. It has successively acquired an unquestionable versatility of application, thanks to a rare mix of mineralogy and textural and structural features, combined with excellent technical properties. Given the role played by this stone in almost any aspect of the area – cultural, architectural, production and social – it is proposed for candidacy as a Global Heritage Stone Resource.

Abstract Rapakivi granites were in use during the Middle Ages in Finland. Their most spectacular use, however, was for structures built in St Petersburg between 1760 and 1917. Remarkable examples are the majestic and slender Alexander Column and the 112 columns of St Isaac's Cathedral. All Rapakivi granite was extracted from the Wiborg Rapakivi granite batholith in several quarries around the municipality of Virolahti in SE Finland (old Russia). Today, the 1640 Ma-old Wiborg batholith is the most important area for natural stone production in Finland and in the Leningrad region, Russian Federation. The main quarried stone varieties of Rapakivi granite (Baltic Brown, Baltic Green, Carmen Red, Karelia Red, Eagle Red and Balmoral Red) are regularly produced in large quantities in Finland for the global stone market due to the stone's unique qualities. Examples of applications in Rapakivi granite from Finland can be found in the USA, China, South Africa, the UK, Italy, Austria, Ireland, Spain and Germany as well as in Scandinavia and Russia. There are also quarries near Vyborg, the Russian Federation: Vozrozhdenie and Ala-Noskua.

Abstract Échaillon stone, a Mesozoic platform limestone from SE France, is proposed as a Global Heritage Stone Resource. The Échaillon stone quarries are located at the western termination of the Alps, near the city of Grenoble. Stone from the main Échaillon quarries is an Upper Jurassic to Berriasian bioclastic near-reef limestone, renowned for its two characteristic white and pink colours. Two ancillary quarries nearby, the Lignet and Rovon quarries, provided the Lower Cretaceous (Barremian to Aptian) Yellow Échaillon stone, of lagoonal origin. Échaillon stone's unique characteristics, resistance to weathering and high aesthetic values made it a prized building and ornamental material used in many significant historical buildings in Europe, North Africa and the USA. Although the first use of Échaillon stone in buildings dates from the Gallo-Roman period, the industrial use ranges from the mid-nineteenth century, during the heyday of the Beaux-Arts architecture period in France, to the mid-twentieth century. The reputation of Échaillon stone was bolstered by world-renowned architects, sculptors and artists who used it for historical building ornament and sculptures. By the turn of the twentieth century, production started to decline and it ceased by the middle of that century.

Abstract By virtue of its use in iconic monuments and historic buildings in the USA, Cockeysville marble, a dolomitic to calcitic lower Paleozoic (Cambrian/Ordovician) marble quarried in Baltimore County and adjacent areas in Maryland, is proposed as a potential Global Heritage Stone Resource. The most important use of this stone was for the Washington Monument in Washington, DC whose construction began in 1848; the second most important use was for the 108 columns of the United States Capitol's wings, completed in 1868. It was also used for two of the oldest major marble monuments in the USA, Baltimore's Battle Monument (dedicated in 1827) and Washington Monument (completed in 1829), as well as Baltimore's City Hall, Buffalo's Adkins Art Museum, Detroit's Fisher Building and parts of St Patrick's Cathedral in New York City. During the nineteenth century white Cockeysville was most desired, but a colourful variety, Mar Villa marble, was also used in the first decades of the twentieth century. Cockeysville marble is no longer quarried for dimension stone. All Cockeysville used outdoors has weathered to a lesser or great extent, but early testing indicating that the dolomitic marble would be more durable has proved to be true.

Abstract The Puerto Princesa Underground River, amongst the largest caves of the Philippine Islands, is the most visited show cave in the country, even though it has undergone no tourism adaptation at all. Its scientific importance primarily relies on the fact that it is one of the largest known underground estuaries in the world, and the effect of tides is visible along more than 7 km of the cave length. The complex relationships between sea and freshwater influence not only the hydrodynamics of the system and the speleogenetic processes presently active, but also its climate and its ecosystem. The systematic exploration and research of this coastal karst system started some 40 years ago and have shown that the Puerto Princesa Underground River is one of the most important caves in the world with regard to many different scientific fields. Speleogenesis concerns the initial phreatic solution followed by vadose erosion with periodical marine invasion, and subsequent saline/freshwater-mixing processes during sea-level highstands. The hydrodynamic behaviour of the water flowing inside the cave is rather complex, being simultaneously controlled by allogenic recharge and tides. Speleothems abundantly occur with several forms, some of which have never been described before. Several minerals, some of which are very rare, are present, together with palaeontological remains exposed by differential corrosion on rock walls. Last but not least, two large populations of bats and swiftlets sustain a complex subterranean ecosystem.

All geoscience practices have evident repercussions on society. Geoscientists have knowledge and skills to investigate, manage, and intervene on the geosphere, defined as the component of the Earth system constituted by the land surface, the solid Earth, the hydrosphere, the cryosphere, and the atmosphere. This implies ethical obligations. The adoption of ethical principles is essential if geoscientists want to best serve the public good. Ethical responsibility by all geoscientists requires a more active role while interacting with society. Geoethics, which investigate the ethical, social, and cultural implications of geoscience research, practice, and education, represents a new way of thinking about and practicing earth sciences, focusing on issues related to the relationship of the geoscientist with the self, colleagues, and society in the broadest sense. In this paper, we define some of the main values relevant to geoethics.

Abstract This chapter explores people’s experience of the physical landscape in Scotland from the perspective of parallel developments in geological science, landscape aesthetics and tourism since the middle of the eighteenth century. It begins with tourism of awe, inspired by the Romantic movement and the excitement of discovering natural wonders promoted through contemporary literature and art during the development of modern geological science in the late eighteenth–early nineteenth centuries. Popular interest and engagement in geology declined with increasing scientific specialization, although the physical landscape continued to draw many visitors and provide creative inspiration for poets and artists. In the 1940s, the beginnings of statutory geoconservation were accompanied by renewed interest in raising public awareness of geology and the physical landscape mainly through didactic methods. More recently, exploration of the cultural links between geology and landscape is providing new opportunities for experiential re-engagement, a shift that recognizes the close links between people and the physical landscape, and one promoted through voluntary sector activity in geoconservation and the development of Geoparks. Rediscovering a sense of wonder and reconnecting with the landscape offer a means of reconciling the natural and cultural worlds and enabling wider public appreciation of geodiversity.

Abstract Waterfalls have long attracted the attention of travellers, some of whom were writers and artists who have left us a cultural legacy of their observations and interpretations. Likewise, geologists have studied and recorded these landscape features since the infancy of their science. An examination of travellers’ experiences of waterfalls since the emergence of Romanticism in eighteenth-century Europe reveals a variety of responses, both utilitarian and aesthetic. Seen as valuable sources of renewable energy, impediments to navigation, beautiful, sublime or picturesque natural wonders and resources for tourism, waterfalls continue to appeal to the Romantic traveller and the pleasure-seeking tourist. Increasingly, waterfalls are being threatened by schemes to exploit them, especially for power generation or intensive tourism development. In many parts of the world, this presents a serious challenge to those responsible for the management of this often spectacular aspect of geodiversity. This paper explores these various themes which are contextualized within the historical and cultural framework of Romanticism.

Abstract The career of the Austrian-born landscape painter Eugene von Guérard (1811–1901) was defined by his travels, which took him to Italy and Germany in the 1830s and 1840s and to Australia and New Zealand between 1852 and 1882. Today he is recognized as one of Australia’s greatest nineteenth-century landscape painters. His formative years coincided with the emergence of geology as an independent scientific discipline and a growing awareness in the wider community of the role played by volcanic activity and other geological processes in the formation of the Earth’s geomorphology. This new understanding was particularly pertinent to landscape painters, whose very subject was the form of the land; in Germany, where von Guérard trained and worked between 1838 and 1852, its relevance for landscape painters was emphasized by the influential natural scientist Alexander von Humboldt and the scientist, landscape painter and art theorist Carl Gustav Carus. They argued that the artist should paint from a geologically informed perspective. Von Guérard’s interest in volcanic geology was sparked by his experiences in southern Italy, consolidated in Germany on expeditions through the Harz and Eifel regions and then fully realized in response to the landscapes of southeastern Australia. Through his informed portrayal of sites of geological significance in each hemisphere and through the cultural value invested in them as a consequence of his depiction of them, von Guérard epitomized that recently conceived construct: the geotourist.

Abstract It is only in the last 100 years or so that most of Britain has been covered by accurate, published, topographic and geological maps. Although travellers’ guides were available from the late seventeenth century, they lacked adequate maps. Whilst fairly accurate maps of the major roads were published in the early seventeenth century as strip maps, topographic maps were not generally available until the nineteenth century. Cartographers, usually when preparing county maps, struggled with the representation of Britain’s varied topography. In the nineteenth century, medium-scale (1-inch-to-the-mile) topographic maps initially developed through the agency of the prizes offered by the Royal Society of Arts but primarily due to the Ordnance Survey. Geological maps benefitted from improved base maps – those of John Cary and the Ordnance Survey. This paper especially explores and illustrates the development of maps and the role they played in the depiction and understanding of landscape and promotion of the major early geotourism region of the Peak District from 1780 to 1930.

Abstract The limestone caves of Stoney Middleton Dale are a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) for features of geological interest, but have been open access since at least the eighteenth century and have a documented history of geotourism. Using the examples of Carlswark Cavern and Merlin Cavern, this chapter sets out evidence that 300 years of open access has resulted in significant disturbance to the features of geological interest. In particular, the integrity of the overall site for scientific research was affected by historical removal of speleothem formations long before it became a SSSI, with damage still occurring today. As most cave SSSIs in Derbyshire have historically had similar open-access arrangements, the examples presented highlight that there is potential for the integrity of less well historically documented caves elsewhere to have been disturbed. This article highlights the importance of establishing a baseline of historical disturbance to recognize whether the integrity of cave SSSIs have been affected and help monitor if disturbance is still occurring. For cave SSSIs to be useful for geological research, it is suggested that there is a need for the historical legacy of open access to individual caves elsewhere to be better understood.

Abstract Carclaze tin mine was an open pit operation which exploited a massive cassiterite-bearing greisen-bordered quartz-tourmaline vein stockwork, straddling the granite margin near St Austell. It became a ‘must-see’ location for visitors to Cornwall from all over Europe in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, particularly those interested in the then-fashionable pursuits of geology and mineralogy. Intellectually, the early scientific interest in Carclaze can be seen as part of the Enlightenment, but in the nineteenth century the influence of Romanticism can also be detected. Much of the attraction was due to the openness and accessibility of Carclaze pit, which allowed the geology to be easily appreciated. This resulted in the development of the mine being particularly well documented by a large number of contemporary accounts and illustrations, which has also enabled an early, partly underground, canal to be rediscovered. The earliest account was by the Frenchman M. Jars who visited the pit in 1765; this was followed by accounts by other French geotourists from the early to mid-nineteenth century. The Germans Von Oeynhausen and Von Dechen provided the first geological map and cross-section of the pit in 1829. Accounts by local Cornish authors emphasize that Carclaze was a significant ‘sight’ for visitors. The earliest account of the pit by an English geologist was by Adam Sedgwick in 1822 ; in later publications he speculated on the formation of parallel vein swarms and schorl rock, partly based on his observations in Carclaze Old Tin Pit. De la Beche provided a pen-and-ink sketch of the south face of the pit in 1839. There are also many accounts by non-scientific visitors throughout the nineteenth century and, together with published lithographs, these are particularly helpful in describing and showing the methods of mining. Tin extraction from the Old Tin Pit had practically ceased by the mid-nineteenth century as production switched to china clay from new pits to the north. The historic south face of the Old Tin Pit, as illustrated by De La Beche, has survived into the twenty-first century and has been designated a County Geology Site by the Cornwall Geoconservation Group, although it is now threatened by housing and industrial development proposals.