Man and the Glacial PeriodWright, G. Frederick (George Frederick)
History
Man and the Glacial Period
Wright, G. Frederick (George Frederick)
Glacial epoch; Prehistoric peoples
So shallow are the Baltic Sea and the German Ocean, that their basins
were easily filled with ice, upon which Scandinavian boulders could be
transported westward to the east shore of England, southward into the
plains of Germany, and eastward far out upon the steppes of Russia. The
islands north of Scotland bear marks also of an ice-movement from the
direction of Norway. If Scotland itself was not overrun with Scandinavian
glaciers, the reason was that it had ice enough of its own, and from
its highlands set up a counter-movement, which successfully resisted
the invasion from the Scandinavian Peninsula. But, elsewhere in Europe,
Scandinavian ice moved freely outward to the extent of its capacity.
Then, as now also, the Alps furnished centres for ice-movement, but the
glaciers were limited to the upper portions of the valleys of the Rhône,
the Rhine, and the Danube upon the west and north, and to a still smaller
area upon the southern side.
[Illustration: Fig. 40.
MAP showing
GLACIATED AREAS
in North America and Europe.]
_Central and Southern Europe._
The main centres of ice-movement in the Alps during the Glacial period
are the same as those which furnish the lingering glaciers of the present
time. From the water-shed between the Rhine, the Rhône, and the Aar,
glaciers of immense size descended all the valleys now occupied by those
streams. The valley of the Rhône between the Bernese and the Pennine
Alps was filled with a glacier of immense depth, which was maintained
by fresh supplies from tributaries upon either side as far down as
Martigny. Glacial markings at the head of the Rhône Valley are found upon
the Schneestock,[BK] at an elevation above the sea of about 11,500 feet
(3,550 metres), or about 1,500 feet above the present surface of the
Rhône Glacier. At Fiesch, about twenty miles below, where tributaries
from the Bernese Oberland snow-fields were received, the thickness of
the glacier was upwards of 5,000 feet (1,680 metres). Near Martigny,
about fifty miles farther down the valley, where the glacier was abruptly
deflected to the north, the depth of the ice was still upwards of 1,600
metres. From Martigny northward the thickness of the ice decreased
rapidly for a few miles, where, at the enlargement of the valley above
the head of Lake Geneva, it was less than 1,200 metres in thickness, and
spread out over the intervening plain as far as Chasseron, with a nearly
level surface, transporting, as we have before said, Alpine boulders
to the flanks of the Juras, and landing them about 3,000 feet (1,275
metres) above the level of Lake Geneva. The width of the main valley is
here about fifty miles, making the slope of the surface of the ice about
twenty feet to the mile.
[Footnote BK: A. Falsan's La Période Grlaciaire étudiée principalement en
France et en Suisse, chapitre xv.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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