The geography and geology of south-eastern EgyptBall, John
Science
The geography and geology of south-eastern Egypt
Ball, John
Geology -- Egypt; Physical geography -- Egypt
=Biotite-granite= of a well-defined type [10,390] occurs somewhat
largely in the mountains round the heads of Wadi Abu Ghusun and Wadi
el Abiad. It is a whitish rock with dark-brown to black spots (_see_
Plate XXII). The white portion of the rock consists of quartz and
felspar; the dark spots are biotite. Generally the rock is of medium
grain, the biotite being in nests two to four millimetres diameter
scattered through the mass, giving it a speckled appearance. Sometimes
the biotite is more uniformly scattered, giving the rock a grey
aspect. At some places the rock shows signs of crushing, this being
indicated in hand specimens by a tendency to laminar arrangement
of the biotite patches. Under the microscope (_see_ Fig. 6), the
felspars, which are somewhat more abundantly present than the
quartz, are seen to consist of orthoclase and oligoclase, with
here and there crystals showing the characteristic cross hatching
of microcline. The biotite is mostly in nests and clusters of
ragged-looking crystals, but it also occurs in tiny flakes included
in the felspars, sometimes showing a distinct arrangement along the
cleavage planes of the latter. The biotite is usually fairly fresh;
it is highly pleochroic, with colour ranging from pale yellow to deep
olive-green in different positions over the nicol. Associated with the
biotite are a few wisps of colourless mica, probably muscovite, and
irregular granules of opaque iron oxides. Granules of epidote are to
be seen in the altering felspars, and there are a few small irregular
granules of a brownish highly refracting mineral, probably sphene.
A much more acid type of biotite granite [11,507] occurs in close
proximity to serpentine in low hills near the wells of Abraq. In this
the proportion of biotite is so small that the rock might almost
be classed as an aplite. It is a fine-grained white rock, very
fresh-looking, with dark spots; in hand specimens it almost exactly
resembles the hornblende granite of Gebel Elba (_see_ Plate XXII),
but examination with a lens shows the dark spots to consist of biotite
instead of hornblende. The microscopic slide shows quartz, orthoclase,
and oligoclase with granitic structure, with here and there small
straggling crystals of brown biotite; the brown biotite is sometimes
altering to chlorite with change of colour from brown to green.
=Muscovite-granite= is rarely met with in South-Eastern Egypt. A
specimen from Gebel Adar Qaqa[128] [12,138] is a fine-grained hard
pinkish rock of sp. gr. 2·62, composed of quartz, orthoclase,
oligoclase, muscovite, and garnet.
A very coarse-grained variety of muscovite-granite, in which the
individual crystals measure several centimetres across, forms white
hills to the east of Wadi Nugrus.
=Hornblende-granite= occurs in several forms, giving rise to rocks
of different aspects in different parts of the district.
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