Athena Review Image Archive ™
Roderick Murchison portrait (ca. 1852)
Roderick Murchison at about age 60 (daguerrotype, ca. 1852)
Roderick Impey Murchison (1792-1871) was a Scottish geologist who first discovered and defined the Silurian, Devonian, and Permian periods. In the early 1830s, Murchison researched and named the Silurian period (named for the Silures, an ancient Welsh tribe) from the series of paleozoic strata in England and Wales and associated fossils. He then helped define the subsequent Devonian period, based on strata exposed in Devonshire, England. In the daguerrotype shown here, he is shown holding a fossil ammonite, commonly found in the south coast of England.
In
1840-1841, Murchison visited Russia with E. de Verneuil, an expert on
molluscs, and defined the Permian period based on similarities in
strata and fossil types in both Russia and Britain.
References
Murchison, R. I. 1839. The Silurian System.
Murchison,. R. I., E. de Verneuil,. and A. von Keyserling,. 1845. The Geology of Russia in Europe and the Ural Mountains. London, John Murray.
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