James Nicol

James Nicol (born August 12, 1810 in Traquair near Innerleithen in Peeblesshire , † April 8, 1879 ) was a Scottish geologist and mineralogist .

Grave of Nicol, Grange Cemetery, Edinburgh

Nicol was the son of pastor James Nicol (1769-1819) in Traquair. He studied geology and mineralogy in particular at the University of Edinburgh (with Robert Jameson ) and at the Universities of Bonn and Berlin. He then explored the geology of Scotland, for which he received awards from the Highland Society. In 1847 he became Assistant Secretary of the Geological Society of London . In 1849 he became professor of geology at Queen's College, Cork, and 1853, Regius Professor of Natural History ( Natural History ) at the University of Aberdeen , which he remained until shortly before his death. He is buried in Edinburgh.

In 1847 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh .

He explored the Southern Uplands and the Highlands , where he particularly explored the Paleozoic and its stratigraphy (1848 to 1852) and later the Torridonian Supergroup of the Proterozoic in the northwestern Highlands. He was involved with Roderick Murchison in the so-called Highland controversy over the geology of Scotland. It was about the complex sequence of layers within the Moine Thrust Belt in the highlands, the later of Charles Lapworth , John Horne and Ben Peach was clarified (structure of a thrust sheet ). Nicol and Murchison, the founders of the exploration of the Silurian, initially worked together in the highlands, but after an excursion in 1855 there was a break in the interpretation of the Moine Thrust. While Murchison saw a chronological sequence of layers, Nicol suspected (as confirmed later) a much more complex structure.

Fonts

• A guide to the geology of Scotland 1844
• On the Structure of the North-Western Highlands, Quart. Journ, Geol. Soc., 1861
• On the Geological Structure of the Southern Grampians, Quart. Journ, Geol. Soc. 1863
• Manual of Mineralogy (1849)
• Elements of Mineralogy (1858, 2nd ed., 1873)
• Geological Map of Scotland (1858)
• Geology and Scenery of the North of Scotland (1866).

literature

• David Oldroyd : The Highlands Controversy, University of Chicago Press 2000

Individual evidence

1. ^ Fellows Directory. Biographical Index: Former RSE Fellows 1783–2002. (PDF file) Royal Society of Edinburgh, accessed March 25, 2020 . 
2. ↑ Website on the Highland Controversy, University of Leeds ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.