The present position of Sri Lanka and its past fit in Gondwanaland are investigated in relation to the development of the Indian Ocean. The 3 stages in the evolution of the Indian Ocean are shown to be controlled by fundamental NW, NS, and NE Precambrian lineament directions in Sri Lanka and South India. These older lineaments were rejuvenated in the Mesozoic–Tertiary to form oceanic transform faults which determined the phases of Indian Ocean floor spreading.

A liquefaction layer displaying ball and pillow structures occurs within the back reef facies of the Cawdor Limestone (P2 zone) near Wirksworth. This layer consists of pillow-shaped masses of coarse biosparite within a biomicrite matrix. The pillows are 0.6–0.8 m thick and 1.5–4.0 m across. Experiments using layers of calcareous sand above calcareous mud have demonstrated that such structures may be produced by subjecting saturated sediments to seismic shocks. These Viséan carbonate ball and pillow structures are attributed to loading, resulting from liquefaction of underlying calcareous mud during the passage of earthquake shock waves associated with the Gulf Fault.

Assemblages of calcareous foraminifera and algae have been examined in thin sections of Dinantian limestones from the Skipton, Broughton, Hetton, Eshton, Swinden and Lothersdale anticlines in the Craven Lowlands. Provisional identifications are listed for each assemblage and a correlation of the rock successions is suggested. The assemblages range from late Tournaisian to late Viséan in age, in terms of the Belgian divisions, and from Courceyan to Asbian in terms of the new chronostratigraphic stages of George et al. (1976).

The Adrano area covers approximately 150 km2 of the tower SW flanks of Mount Etna, Sicily. A wide selection of the rocks that occur on the volcano are represented in the area. Lavas of alkalic affinity form by far the greater proportion of the volcanics in the area, and comprise a trachybasaltic suite of lavas ranging from hawaiite through mugearite to benmoreite. There appears to be no overall progressive variation in the chemistry of these trachybasaltic lavas with time; rather that the parental magma has remained fairly constant in composition. Periodically, however, this parental magma has been able to differentiate into more evolved products. The chemical variation shown by the trachybasaltic lavas can be largely explained by crystal fractionation of augite, olivine, plagioclase and titanomagnetite at moderate to low pressures. Crystal fractionation, however, cannot explain the variation in the alkalis which is thought to be affected by volatile transfer.

In 1957, Hudson, Eames & Wilkins proposed the name of Hammar Formation for a series of sands and silts below the surface alluvium of the Mesopotamian Plains near Basrah, Iraq, which yielded a marine molluscan fauna of Holocene age. This paper shows that deposits yielding a very similar molluscan fauna are present at shallow depths at Amarah and Qurmat Ali, and lists the numerous foraminifera recovered from these deposits. Marine or brackish water conditions are thus shown to have prevailed in recent times over a distance of at least 250 km NW of the present head of the Persian Gulf.

The orthidine brachiopod Heterorthis alternata (J. de C. Sowerby 1839) is here recorded from the River Onny Cliff Section at an horizon high in the Onnia superba Zone of the Onnian Stage. Previously it had only been recorded from rocks of Upper Longvillian, Marshbrookian and Actonian age of South Salop and of Upper Caradoc age of Morocco.