David R. Oldroyd
This issue sees the completion of Davis Young’s epic series of five articles (175 pages in total) setting out the story of the attempt to establish a formalised scheme of petrological classification and terminology, based on the results of chemical analyses. It was devised after a huge effort by four American petrologists (Cross, Iddings, Pirsson, and Washington: hence the sobriquet, the ‘CIPW’ system). In the end, their system didn’t catch on. The system was desperately complicated and had a ‘baroque’ nomenclature/terminology, which though perhaps euphonious must in practice have been exceedingly difficult to memorise and use. Professor...
You do not have access to this content, please speak to your institutional administrator if you feel you should have access.
