The Palaeogene volcanic succession of the Faroe Islands in the NE Atlantic Ocean is formalised using a purely lithostratigraphic approach and following international guidelines. The Faroe Islands Basalt Group (FIBG) has a gross stratigraphic thickness of ∼6·6 km, dominated by subaerial basalt lava flows, and is subdivided into seven formations. The Lopra Formation forms the basal ∼1·1 km of the Lopra-1/1A borehole, dominated by hyaloclastites, volcaniclastic sandstones and invasive basaltic lavas/sills. It is overlain by the ∼3·25 km-thick Beinisvørð Formation, dominated by laterally extensive basalt sheet lobes separated by minor volcaniclastic lithologies. The Beinisvørð Formation is overlain by the <15 m-thick, inter-eruption, coal-bearing facies of the Prestfjall Formation and the <50 m-thick, syn-eruption, pyroclastic and sedimentary facies of the Hvannhagi Formation. Lava flow volcanic activity resumed with the <1·4 km-thick Malinstindur Formation, dominated by thinly bedded compound basalt lava flows. The top of this formation is marked by a regional disconformity surface, overlain by sandstone and conglomerate deposits of the maximum 30 m-thick Sneis Formation, a newly recognised stratigraphic unit. The final phase of volcanism recorded on the Faroe Islands consists of the >900 m-thick Enni Formation composed of a mixture of basalt sheet lobes and compound flows with abundant volcaniclastic units, e.g. the Argir Beds, that may require a further subdivision at this stratigraphic level. The new lithostratigraphy allows for more refined biostratigraphical and sequence stratigraphic correlations and prepares for a revised geological map of the Faroe Islands.

A comparative study of three main igneous rock associations that plot in the K2O–SiO2 diagram shoshonite field: shoshonite series absarokites–shoshonites–banakites (henceforth referred to as shoshonites s.l.), vaugnerites, and potassic lamprophyres, reveals that similarities between the associations are superficial. Vaugnerites and lamprophyres are more magnesian, richer in large ion lithophile and high field strength elements and have higher light rare earth/heavy rare earth ratios than shoshonites. Furthermore, shoshonites have low radiogenic heat production, typical of subduction-related rocks, but most vaugnerites and some lamprophyres are highly radioactive. Relative to bulk-Earth, shoshonites have depleted, asthenospheric mantle-like Sr and Nd isotope signatures, whereas vaugnerites and potassic lamprophyres have enriched, crust or lithospheric mantle-like compositions. Though vaugnerites and some lamprophyres show evidence of crustal contamination, the contaminated magma was not originally shoshonitic. Their composition is consistent with derivation from a metasomatised upper mantle source enriched long before melting, thus precluding an active subduction setting. In conclusion, the term shoshonite, implying late-stage arc magmas, cannot be applied to a rock series simply because it plots into the K2O–SiO2 diagram shoshonite field. Shoshonites with a subduction-related source may, however, be identified by discriminant function analysis.

A number of approaches to interpreting geochemical data for categorising and correlating metabentonites are presented. Bulk rock geochemistry, combined with data from cognate minerals, provides the most robust means of characterising an altered ash bed. While it is not possible at present to identify one single parameter which can uniquely fingerprint an altered ash bed, it is possible to come close to an unique fingerprint, or ‘Golden Spike’, by utilising an array of geochemical parameters comprising bulk rock element ratios, Rare Earth Elements, Sr and Nd isotopic ratios in apatite, composition of sandine phenocrysts, and the chemical composition of melt inclusions.

In the recently completed and formally ratified new series and stage classification of the Ordovician System, the base of the Middle Ordovician Series coincides with the base of the global Dapingian Stage. In the Global Stratotype Section and Point (GSSP) of this stage, which is located at Huanghuachang in southern China, the base of the Dapingian Stage is defined as the level of first appearance of the conodont Baltoniodus triangularis. The fact that this species, along with some other taxa present at the Dapingian GSSP, occurs in many sections in Baltoscandia makes it possible to recognise with considerable precision the level of this global stage boundary in Sweden, Estonia, northwestern Russia, and Denmark. In several, but not all, regions, especially in the East Baltic, the global stage boundary coincides with the base of the regional Volkhov Stage and can be tied to the base of the Megistaspis polyphemus Trilobite Zone. The regionally somewhat different relationships between the position of the global stage boundary and a very widespread hardground complex are probably due to the occurrence of local and/or regional unconformities in the upper Floian–lower Dapingian interval. Although biostratigraphically important graptolites are present in the study interval in some Baltoscandic sections, the precise graptolite correlation of the base of the Dapingian Stage remains somewhat unclear, although it appears to be near, or at, the base of the Isograptus victoriae victoriae Zone (Ca 2).

The early Cambrian Chengjiang biota in Yunnan, southern China has yielded many articulated exoskeletons of the spiny redlichiid trilobite Eoredlichia intermedia, of which some have their appendages exceptionally well preserved. Both of the paired uniramous antennae of a medium-sized holaspis consist of 46–50 short segments (articles), each of which bears a fine spine near its inner edge. Behind the antennae there are twenty-one pairs of biramous limbs: three pairs are situated underneath the cephalon, one pair underneath each of the fifteen thoracic segments, and probably three pairs underneath the small pygidium. The endopod consists of a broad basis and seven podomeres, of which the last is divided into three terminal spines. The exopod is blade-like, and according to one interpretation, is dorsally hinged to the basis of the endopod; an alternative suggestion being that both the endopod and exopod are split from the basis, the latter being independent and not forming part of the endopod. The exopod has a prominent anterior rim, and possesses about forty long filaments along the posterior margin, and short setae along the rounded distal lobe. The basic appendage features of the redlichiid trilobites, and likewise the gut, are comparable to those of other known Cambrian polymerid trilobites that belong to more distantly related clades.

Regional scale biotite and cordierite-bearing granites (s.l.) in the Variscan of the Central Iberian Zone (CIZ) are spatially closely associated with cordierite-rich nebulites and cordierite-bearing two-mica granites, and with cordierite-rich high grade hornfelses and cordieritites (>60% cordierite) that are relatively common in the aureoles of these granites. Building on published field evidence, petrological data are presented which, combined with new chemical and isotopic (Sr–Nd) modelling, indicate that the cordierite-bearing granites cannot be derived by simple anatexis of regional sedimentary protoliths; but the data are consistent with a process of reactive assimilation that involves the interaction of biotite granite magma with high-grade host rocks ranging from cordierite nebulites to andalusite-bearing cordieritites. The contribution of the postulated cordierite-rich contaminants to the diversity of cordierite granite compositions is modelled using the compositions of regional Lower Cambrian–Upper Neoproterozoic metasedimentary rocks that are generally chemically mature (CaO very rarely exceeds 1·4%). These rocks include specific horizons in which extreme chemical alteration is attributable to sediment reworking during eustatic falls in sea level. Such compositions may account for the presence of the high concentrations in Al that later produced cordieritites. Fractional crystallisation is also important, particularly in generating the more evolved cordierite granite and cordierite biotite muscovite granite compositions. Although assimilation in situ is normally regarded as a minor contributor volumetrically to evolving plutons, in this instance the emplacement of large volumes of granite magma into a high-T–low-P environment significantly increased the potential for reactive assimilation.

Though little is known of the graptoloid reproductive mechanism, graptolites with putatively sac-like appendages, supposedly ovarian vesicles, have been known from the Moffat Shales Group, Southern Uplands, Scotland, for over 150 years. Locally, these co-occur with isolated, two-dimensional, discoidal or ovato-triangular fossils. In the 1870s, Nicholson interpreted these isolated fossils as being graptoloid ‘egg-sacs’ detached from their parent and existing as free-swimming bodies. He assigned them to his genus Dawsonia, though the name was pre-occupied by a trilobite, and named four species: D. campanulata, D. acuminata, D. rotunda and D. tenuistriata. A reassessment of Nicholson’s type material from the Silurian of Moffatdale, Scotland, and from the Ordovician Lévis Formation of Quebec, Canada, shows that Dawsonia Nicholson comprises the inarticulate brachiopods Acrosaccus? rotundus, Paterula? tenuistriata and Discotreta cf. levisensis, the tail-piece of the crustacean Caryocaris acuminata and the problematic fossil D. campanulata. Though D. campanulata resembles sac-like graptolite appendages, morphometric analysis reveals the similarity to be superficial and the systematic position of this taxon remains uncertain. There is no definite evidence of either D. campanulata or sac-like graptoloid appendages having had a reproductive function.