The Downton Castle Sandstone is a

geologic formation A geological formation, or simply formation, is a body of rock having a consistent set of physical characteristics ( lithology) that distinguishes it from adjacent bodies of rock, and which occupies a particular position in the layers of rock exp ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. It preserves

fossils A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved in ...

dating back to the

Silurian The Silurian ( ) is a geologic period and system spanning 24.6 million years from the end of the Ordovician Period, at million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning of the Devonian Period, Mya. The Silurian is the shortest period of the Paleozo ...

period Period may refer to: Common uses * Era, a length or span of time * Full stop (or period), a punctuation mark Arts, entertainment, and media * Period (music), a concept in musical composition * Periodic sentence (or rhetorical period), a concept ...

. As its name would suggest the formation predominantly consists of sandstone with minor siltstone and mudstone. The oldest known

Trigonotarbid The order Trigonotarbida is a group of extinct arachnids whose fossil record extends from the late Silurian to the early Permian (Pridoli epoch, Pridoli to Sakmarian).Dunlop, J. A., Penney, D. & Jekel, D. 2020A summary list of fossil spiders and ...

'' Palaeotarbus'' is known from the formation.

References

* Geologic formations of England Silurian System of Europe Silurian England Sandstone formations Silurian southern paleotemperate deposits {{England-stub

See also

References