Ca e Science

seRA

The Transactions of the British Cave Research Association

Volume

12

Number

March

1985

Amorphous speleothems
Speleology in the U.S.S.R.
B.C.R.A. Symposium abstracts
Percolation water at Altamira
The earliest cave photograph

Cave Science

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Cave Science

TRANSACTIONS OF THE BRITISH CAVE RESEARCH ASSOCIATION

Volume 12

Number 1

March 1985

Contents
Amorphous Speleothems
Brian L. Findlayson and John A. Webb

Speleology in the U.S.S.R

V.N. Dublyansky, A .B. Klimchouk and V.E. Kissely ov

B.C.R.A. Cave Science Symposium, November 1984

Abstracts

19

Natural Evolution of Percolation Water in Altamira Cave

E. Villar e t al

21

The World's Earliest Underground Cave Ph o tograph

by Alfre d Brothers F.R.A.S.
Chris Howes

25

Cover: A stalagmite grotto in the Archery cave, a 3000 metre l o n g

system in th e Malyykavkaz mountains near Tbilisi, in th e
southern U.S.S.R .. By A.B. Klimchouk

Editor : Dr . T . D. Ford , Geology Dept ., Leicester University , Leicester LEi 7RH

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CAVE SCIENCE Vol. 12 , No . 1, March 1985

Transactions of the British Cave Research Association

Amorphous Speleothems
Brian L . FINLAYSON and John A. WEBB
Abstract :
Attention is drawn to three amorphous mineral groups which may
be more widely represented in speleothems than speleolog ical lit erature
suggests.
Opal is hydrous silica, in three structural groups (opal -C ,
opal - CT and opal - A) , usually identified using X- ray diffraction.
Opal
speleothems are relatively common in lava caves and have also been
identified in limestone and granite caves . The conditions under which opal
precipitates from solution are likely to be contro lled by temperature and
evaporation . Allophane is amorphous aluminosilicate clay mineral of widely
varing composition .
It can be identified using the test of Fieldes and
Perrott (1966) , confirmed by IR spectroscopy.
Allophane speleothems have
been positively identified in granite caves and may also be present
elsewhere .
Precipitation of allophane is most likely due to a rise in pH
produced
by
CO,
outgassing .
The
iron - rich
mineral
series
ferrihydrite - hisingerite has not been positively identified in speleothems
but may have been misidentified as goethite in some cases.
These minerals
can be identified using IR spectroscopy .

cristobalite ,
opal ,
coesite,
stishovite
and
lecha te lieri te ; each of these polymorphs has its
own distinct morphology and cell dimensions.
The
thr ee principal crystalline forms of silica are
quartz , tridymite and cristobalite, and each has a
low
temperature
and
high
temperature
phase,
designated
and
respectively.
These
three
minerals have quite distinct crystal structures,
which are trigonal , orthorhombic and tetragonal
respectively for the low temperature ( ) phases.
The high temperature phases, along with coesite,
stishovite and lechatelierite, cannot form at
atmospheric temp eratures and pressures and will
not be considered further .
Quartz
its elf
occurs
as
two
distinct
varieties : macrocrystalline and cryptocrystalline
(submicrocrystallin e ) .
The latter is normally
classed as the subspecies chalcedony, and consists
of quartz crystallites , often fibrous in form ,
separated by submicroscopic pores.
Two of the silica minerals are amphorous :
lechatelierite (silica glass) and opal.
Th e term
opal is generally used for the compact, vitreous
forms of naturally occurring hydrous silicas; the
friable
or
dispersed
forms
(e.g .
geyserite ,
diat omite )
have been
termed
" opaline silica "
(Jon es and Segnit , 1971).
However , many authors
use opal as an all -enc ompassing term for natural
hydr ous silica.
Historically opal has been considered an
amorphous mineraloid without crystal structure ,
but recent work has indicated that there are
several
varieties
with
different
degrees
of
structural order .
Jones and Segni t (1971) have
shown
th at
natural
hydrous
silicas
can
be
subdivided into three structural groups : o pal-C
(well ordered 0< cristobalite ), opal -C T (dis ordered
~ cristobalite )
and opal-A (highly disordered).
Although the X-ray diffraction pattern of opa l-C
is very similar to that of 0< cristobal ite , it is
not
appropriate
to
refer
to
opal - C
as
C(cristobalite because opal - C (and opal - CT) shows
evidence of tridymitic stacking (Jones and Segnit,
1971,
p.
57 ) .
Furthermore ,
0< cristobalite
contains little or no water , whereas opal contains
at least 3% water (Jones and Segnit , 1971 ; Wilding
et al . , 1977) .
Thus
the
three
varieties
of
opal
are
structurally distinct from eac h other and from
their
relative
cristobalite.
Previously
some
mineralogists
had regarded opa l as a form of
cristobalite
(e . g .
Frondel,
1962 ) ,
and
some
speleogical workers (e . g . Hill, 1976; White 1976)
have continued to use the two terms synonymously
when describing opaline speleothems.
However ,
pure crystalline cristobalite has yet
to be
positively identified as a spel eo them mineral .
High
magnification
transmission
electron

INTRODUCT I ON
Speleothems
(secondary
mineral
deposits
formed in caves ) may be composed of a wide variety
of minerals, the vast majority of them crystalline
(Hi l l , 1976 ).
Only two amorphous minerals , opal
and allophane , have been positive l y identified in
speleolog ical literature.
Furthermore , the names
app l ied
to
these
minerals
have
often
been
con t radictory and incorrect , and the methods of
identification have
frequently been
far
from
rigorous.
The
purpose
of
this
paper
is
to
draw
attention to opal and allophane as speleothem
minerals ,
to
set
out
clearly
the
best
mineralogical nomenclature for them , and to list
the most reliable methods of identification.
I n addit i on , the iron - rich mi neral ser i es
ferrihydrite-hisingerite
is
briefly discussed.
Although no positive identifications of these
minerals have been made in speleothems, perusal of
the literature suggests that they may have been
misidentified as goethite in some cases.
AMORPHOUS MINERALS
Amorphous minerals are non - crystallin e (i . e .
they have little or no structural organisation ,
and thus do not form crystals) .
These minerals
are optical l y iso t ropic in th i n section (dark
under crossed polars ) and they do not diffract
X- rays .
As a result , their X- ray diffraction
patterns lack sharp , well - defined peaks , al though
they may show one or more broad reflections .
Amphorous minerals can form either by rapid
cooling

from th e

molten state

( e .g.

silica glass ) ,

. or by slow hardening and dehydration of gels

precipitated from colloida l solutions.
The la t ter
process is the more important , as a number of
naturally occur ring substances can form colloidal
solutions:
hydrated
silica,
hydrated
aluminosilicates , and hydrated iron , manganese and
a lumini urn o xides and hydroxides (Mas on and Berry,
1968)
The
gels
formed
from many of thes e
solutions will transform to crystalline minerals
within a comparatively short period of time , given
the correct chemical conditions .
However , in th e
case of the silica and aluminosilicate gels , the
amorphous minerals formed
(opal and allophane
respectively ) may persist for long time spans .
OPAL
Terminology and Structure
Silic a
distinct

(SiO, ) occurs in nature as se\en

quartz,
tridym i te,
minerals :
3

microscopy has shown that some varieties of

opal - A, in particular gem opals from volcanic host
rocks , are not ent ir ely amorphous , but contain
extremely small crystals of tridymite embedded in
an amorphous matrix (S anders , 1975 ) .
The
presence
of
the
crystalline
phase
tridymit e in some variet i es of opal has been
attributed either to opal diagenesis upon age ing
or to coprecipitation during formation of the opal
(Wi lding et al ., 1977) .
On a macromo l ec ul ar scale , opal is composed
of close - packed agg r egates of silica spheres
ranging from 1,500 - 3 , SOO~ i n diameter , arranged
hexagonally in layers (Jones et al . , 1964) .
In
precious opal these layers serve as grating
surfaces that diffract li ght and result in a play
of colou r s.

minerals and occur only as soft , opaque deposits ,

and limonite is always brown or yellow in colour
and has an earthy lustre .
The analytical technique that most easily
distinguishes the different varieties of opa l is
X-r ay diffraction (XRD). As Fig. 1 shows, the XRD
patterns of opal - C, opal - CT and opal - A are quite
different from each other
and XRD provides a
rapid , reliable way of identifying the opal type
present in a speleothem . The centre of the broad ,
diffuse peak characteristics of opal-A may vary
slightly in wave l ength , from a n ormal position of
about 4.1 - 4.3~ (Jones and Se2nit, 1971 ; Wilding et
a 1., 1977 ) to as low as 3 . 7J\. (Webb and Finlayson,
1984) .
Chalcedony can be readily distinguished from
opal
using
XRD.
Because
chalcedony
is
an
extremely fine - grained form of quartz, it gives
the quartz XRD pattern , with prominent peaks at
3 .34~ and 4 . 26Jt.
Other analytical techniques, e . g . infra-red
absorption spectroscopy (Plyusnina , 1979), can be
used to distinguish the opal var i eties from each
other
and
from
the
other
silica
minerals.
However, such techniques are usually less widely
available than XRD .

Composition
Opal is hydrous silica
(Si O, .nH, 0) .
Th e
water content commonly varies between 3% and 11% ,
a lt hough it can occasionally be much higher
(Segnit et al. , 1965; Wilding et al ,. 1977 ). Opal
may a ls o include significant amo unts of occluded ,
chemisorbed or solid s olution impurities including
Al , O, (u p to 3% ) Fe,O, (up to 2%), MgO (up to
1.S%), CaO , Na,O and K,O
(all l ess than 1 %;
Frondel, 1962 ).
Opal in plants and soils may
contain higher levels of some of these impurities
(Wilding et al. , 1977).

Opal in Speleothems
Opal has been recorded in speleothems form
lava caves and granite caves , and also from
sandstone overhangs .
Opal speleothems are most abundant in lava
caves , where they occur as coralloids, flows tone ,
stalactites,
stalagmites
amd
helicitites,
sometimes intergrown with chalcedony (Hill, 1976 ).
Coralloidal opal appears to be the commonest form ;
often
layers
of botryoidal
opal
coat
lava
stalactites or globules (Swartzlow and Keller ,
1937 ) .
Most opal speleothems in lava caves are
quite small (less than S cm in maximum dimension ) ,
al though Bartrum (1930 ) recorded a 30 cm high opal
and clay stalagmite in a New Zealand lava cave ) .
In limestone caves opal is uncommon, but does
occur occasiona ll y as wall and floor encrustations
(Hill ,
1976) .
Opal has also been
found
in
limestone caves interlayered with calcite and
gypsum in cave blisters (Siegal et al. , 1968;
Hill, 1976) .
Al though
speleothems
are
quite
rare
in
granite caves, small opaline coralloids (P1.2)
have been descr i bed from an eastern Australian
granite cave by Webb and Finlayson (1984) .
Sma l l
opaline
corralloids ,
stalactites ,
stalagmites and botryoidal coatings have been
recorded on exposures of quartz sandstone at
localities in U.S. A. and Australia (P orter , 1979 ;
Lassak ,
1970) .
The
Australian
examples
are
actively growing,
and consist of alternating
layers of opal and a mixture of limonite and
siderite (Lassak , 1970 ).
Very few studies of opaline speleothems have
included X- ray diffracti on data , but in all cases
these have shown that the speleothems are composed
of one of
the
varieties
of
opa l
and
not
cristobalite.
Siegel et a1.
( 1968)
described
stalactites of intergrown calcite and opal from
a
limestone
cave
in
Argentina .
The
X- ray
diffraction pattern published in their
paper
clearly identifies the opal as opal -A (although
White
(19 76 )
e rr oneously
referred
to
it as
cristobal it e ) .
Webb ( 1979) used XRD to identify
chalcedony , opal - CT amd opal - A from a lava cave in
eastern
Australia .
The
opal-A
occurred
as
botryoidal crusts where as th e
chalcedony and
opal - CT
formed
flowstone ,
stalactites ,
vein
infillings and ?zeolite pseudomorphs . Cody (1980)
described opal stalagmites and floor encrustations
from lava caves in New Zealand ; although he
performed XRD analyses , he did not use Jones and
Segni t ' s
structura 1 groups ,
or
reproduce
the
diffraction patterns, so it is not possible to
identify the opal types present in his specimens .
The cave coral
(P1.1)
described by Webb and
Finlayson (1984) from two granite caves in eastern
Australia
was
identified
as
opal - A by
XRD;
chemical analysis indicated that these speleothems
also had a small allophane component .
Opaline

Identification
In hand specimen opal is distinguised by its
vitreous
or
waxy
lustre,
moderate
hardness
( S . 5- 6.S ), low density (2.0- 2 . 2) and its common
occurrence
in
rounded
or
botryodial
forms .
Opaline speleothems may be almost identical in
gross morphology to calcareous ones , but can be
readily distinguised by h ardness (calcite - 3 ) or
reaction with dilute hydrochoric ac id (calcite
effervesces vigorously , whereas opal sh ows no
reaction
at
all ).
Chacedony ,
the
cryptocrystalline variety of quar tz, may be very
similar in appearence to opal , but it is harder
( 7) and denser (about 2 . 6) , and usually has a dull
lustre .
In thin section opal is isotropic (dark under
crossed nicols) , and is also distinguished by its
low index of refraction (usually about 1 . 4S),
giving it a moderate - high relief.
Of the other
minerals that can occur in speleothems , on l y
fluorite,
halite,
allophane ,
halloysite
and
limonite are isotropic .
Fluorite and halite are
readily distinguished from opal by their obvious
crystallinity , allophane and halloysite
are clay

________----~~ c
I

50

40

I
30

20

Figure 1. X-ray diffraction patterns for the structural

subdivisions of opal (from Jones and Segnit, 1 97 J ) . A: opal - C
B : opal - CT .
C: opal-A .
(Q - quartz peaks= T - peaks due to
tridymitic stacking)

whereas stalactites and stalagmites are deposited

by water dripping from a particular spot on the
cave roof .
Undoubtedly other factors e . g. shape
of the cave walls or roof , and compos i tion and
dynamics of the cave atm o sphere , also playa part.
ALLOPHANE
Terminology and structure
The clay minerals are a complex and loosely
defined group of finely crystalline , metacol l oidal
or amorphous hydrous silicates , essentially of
aluminium , with a monoclinic crystal lattice of
the two or three layer type (Bates and Jackson ,
1980 ).
Based on structure and composition , the
crystalline clay minerals can be divided into
several
groups ,
e . g.
illite
group ,
kaolinite
group.
The name allophane has been in use s ince 1816
to describe a clay mineral that is naturally
occurring amorphous
hydrous
aluminosilicate of
wi dely varying composition
(Frye , 1981 ).
Many
authors (e . g . Weaver and Pollard , 1973 ; Pyman et
a l. , 1979 ) have used the name in this genera 1
sense .
Allophane has been shown to be randomly
structured rather than amorphous , with a basic
str u ct ur e composed of A1 - 0 , Al-O - OH and A1 - 0- Si
bonds ( Fielded , 1966 ; Wells et al ., 1977 ).
High
resolut i on electron microscopy has indicated that
allophane
con s ists of
" hollow spherules " with
d i ameters of 35 - 55.8. (Wada , 1980 ).
Wada (1980 ) subdivided allophane ( sensu lato )
into allophane (sensu stricto) and allophane - like
constituents .
The distinction was made in terms
of d i fferences in the IR spectra (see F i g . 2 ) and
the molar SiO, jA1, 0) ratios (allophane 0 . 8 - 2.5 ;
allophane - like constituents 0 . 2 - 1 . 4 ).
Allophane
constituents are dissolved by dithionite - citrate
and 2% Na, CO ) solution , whereas allophane is not
(Wada and Greenland , 1970 ).
Some workers have
found difficulty in matching their samples to this
classification (e . g . Young et al. , 1980 ; Webb and
F i nlayson , 1984 ), and Wada (1 982 ) admitted that

1 em

P late 1. Op al -A co ra ll o ids fr o m South Bald Ro ck Cave, a

gra nite ca ve in Gir ra we e n Nat i o nal Park, s o uth-east
Queensla nd.

outgrowths on sandstone exposures in Virginia ,

U. S. A ., we re shown by XRD to be amorphous , i . e .
opal - A ( Porter , 1979 ) .
Formation of opal speleothems
The concentration of dissolved silica in
groundwater is determined largely by the rock type
in contact with the water ( Davis , 1964 ).
Because
conversion of feldspar (particularly plagioclase )
to clay is more important in releasing silica than
direct solution of quartz (Garrels and MacKenzie ,
1967) ,
groundwater
associated
wi th
plagioclase - ~ich
rocks
( pyroclastics ,
lavas ,
intrusives or sediments ) has the highest silica
content .
Thus groundwater in carbonate rocks has
very
low
silica
concentrations
(10 - 15
ppm ) ,
whereas that from basalt terrains may contain
40 - 50 ppm silica , and water from sediments rich in
basic pyroclastics may have up to 85 ppm si l ica
(White et al. , 1963 ; Davis , 196 4).
As lava caves
are almost always formed in basalt , this chemical
dat a shows why opaline speleothems are common in
lava caves .
It also explains why the largest
known silica speleothems (chalcedony f l owstone up
to 30 mm thick and stalactites up to 40 cm long )
are present in a cave in limestone overlain by
pyroclastics deposits (Broughton , 1974 ) .
In
the
free
atmosphere
amorphous
silica
pr e cipitate s more readily than crystalline silica
from
supersatur a ted
solutions .
Apart
from
ov e rgrowths
on
quartz
grains
in
sandstones ,
evidence for the direct precipitations of quartz
at
earth - surface
conditions
is
very
meagre
( Wilding
et
al.,
1977 ) .
Thus
groundwater
solutions supersaturated with respect to silica
will initi a lly precipitate an amorphous silica
gel; this gradually d e hydrates and harderns to
form opal ( Eitel, 1954).
Secondary transformation
from opal - A to opal - CT to chalcedony to quartz ,
reflecting progressive crystalliation , has been
comm o nly o bserv e d (e.g . Markova, 1978 ), and the
form a tion of qu a rtz at the earth ' s surface is
generally atrributed to this process (Wilding et
al. , 1977-).
A fairly long time period (millions
of ye ars) is b e lieved to be necessary for this
c o nv e rsi o n (Mizutani, 1970) .
This explains why
chalcedony
speleothems
are
rare
and
usually
inactive ( Broughton , 1974 ).
The f ac tors causing precipitati o ns of silica
ge l
in ca ves
are
unknown,
but could include
ev a p o ra ti o n , lowe r termpera tures and changes in
pH .
The solubility of a morphous silica increases
1 i nea r ly
with
tempera ture
from
0' C ,
but
is
i n d epe nd en t o f pH bel o w 9 (Wilding et al. , 1977 ) ,
so e v a por a tion a nd temperature are likely to be
th e contr o lling factors.
Evaporation is probably
mo st impor t a nt i n th e formati o n o f coral10idal
opalin e s pe le o th e ms (P o rter, 19 7 9).
The fo rm t a ken by o paline speleothems seems
t o de pend o n th e same fact o rs that affect the
sh ape o f ca lcar eo us sp e l eo thems, particularly the
t ype
an d
rate
of
th e
wa t e r
supply .
Thus
c o r a lloids a ppe a r to form from the thin films of
w ~ t er s eepi ng f rom or fl o wing o ver the wall rock ,

13

12

11

10

x100 c m 1
Fi gure 2 . In f r a -red abso r p t ion spe ctra fo r allophanc and
all ophane -li kc co ns tit uen t s . A : al lophane , preCipitated
in side g ran i t e cave , easte r n Aus tral i a (fr om ~ ebb and
Fin d l a y s on , 1984).
B: a llop hane -lik e c on sti t uent , der i ved
from we athere d pumice , Japan (f r om Wa d a , 198 0 ) . C : a l lopha ne ,
der ived from we ath ered p uni cc , Ja pan

(f r om Wada ,

1980) .

the distinction may be debatable .

Fieldes (1966)
argued
that
the
distinguishing
property
of
allophanes is their structural randomness , which
enables them to be recognised as a group despi t e
variations in composition.
Lassak (1 970 ) studied some actively grow ing
opal/limonite stalactites i n eastern Australia,
and found that these were always associated with
extensive
areas
of
decaying
vegetation .
He
postulated that organic matter in the freshly
precipitated limonite caused it to retain a
negative charge .
Once ox i dation had destroyed
this organic matter , the limonite surface would
become cationic and so prec ipi tate the negatively
charged silica sol.

to Si - 0 bending vibra tions and its pos i tion is

altered by the presence of Al in the framework ; in
the absence of Al the peak is close to 1100/cm .
Wada ' s (1 980 ) suggestion that variations in the IR
spectra can be used to distinguish two types of
a ll ophane appears
to be unreliable ,
and the
observed
variations
are
probably
due
to
differences in A1 : Si ratios (Webb and Finlayson ,
1984 ) .
For
i dentificat ion
of
allophane
in
speleothems , the test of Fields and Perrott (1966)
noted above is the most readily ava il able and for
that reason is recommended.
However, a positive
result should be confirmed by IR spectroscopy and
chemical analysis wherever po ssible.

Composition
Allophane
is
noted
for
its
rang e
of
compostion .
Besides
the
variable
SiO, /Al, 0,
ratios mentioned above ( 0 .2-2. 5 ), the amoun t of
water can vary greatly (up to 40%; Wells et a l.,
1977) .
Phosphate-bearing allophane with 7-10%
phosphate has been described by a number of
authors (see Weaver and Pollard , 1973 ) and organic
carbon may also be a relatively major constituent
(u p to 13 . 2%; Young e t al. , 1980) . The Fe, Ca and
Mg contents of most allophanes a re low, a lth o ugh
the percentage of Fe can be as high as 8% (Young
et al ., 1980). Other elements , e . g. Mn, Ca , K and
Na, are usually present in minor amounts 0.5%).

Allophane in Spel eothems

Early mineralogical references to allophane
(e.g.
Dana ,
1982)
mention
stal act ites
and
mamillary encrustations of the mineral, though
no detailed descriptions have been published .
Allophane in speleothems has b een identified by
Webb and Finlayson (1984) fr om granitic caves in
southern
Queensland,
Australi a .
They
found
al lophane
precipitat ing
as
flowstone
with
a
microgour
surface
(P1 . 2 )
and
a ls o
as
an
intergrowth
in
opa l
coralloids.
Allophane
stalactites up t o 10cm l ong and 2cm in diameter
are known from a lava cave in the basalt flows of
western Victoria , Australia (Webb and Finlayson,
in preparation).

Identification
Allophane
has
no reliable distinguishing
charcteristics in hand specimen and is very simlar
to
other
clay
minerals
and
limonite .
Pure
allophane is very brittle with a hardness of 3 or
less,
a conchoidal to earthy fracture and a
resinous, waxy or earthy lustre. Allophane may be
transparent to translucent but is more usually
opaque , with a wide range of colours (colourless ,
white, green, bluish , yel l ow , brown and pink),
which U. r e derived from impurities.
The specific
gravity varies from 1. 85 to 1.9.
In thin section allophane is isotropic and
has a variable refractive
index
(1. 39-1. 49) .
Allophane in speleothems is frequently thinly
banded and may occur in association with other
minerals such as opal (Webb and Finlayson , 1984).
It is clear that reliable identificati on of
allophane in hand speciment or thin section is not
possible and other diagnostic tests must be used .
Fieldes and Perrott (1966) proposed a rapid field
and laboratory test for allophane .
This t est is
based on the principle that aqueous solutions of
fluorides at pH higher than 7 react at the
hydroxy-aluminium sites , re le ase hydroxyl ions and
cause a rise in pH with a simultaneous formation
of fluoaluminate.
In the test for allophane in
soils a small quantity (10 mg) of soil is placed
on dry
fi 1 ter paper
(previously soaked with
phenolphthalein indicator), and wetted with a drop
of
sat urated
NaF
solution.
If
appreciable
allophane is present the filter paper will turn
red.
Brydon and Day (1 970 ) have shown that this
test cannot be used as a specific test for
a ll ophanes in soils, since other materials, such
as ground gibbsite , amorphous Al (OH)"
synthetic
dioctahedral chlorite and soils with more than 1%
oxalate - extractable aluminium all produce positive
results .
In speleothems
these materials
are
unlikely to be present and the test could be used
to distinguish allophane from other clay minerals
and limonite.
The
XRD
pattern
of
allophane
lacks
well-defined peaks, having broad bands centered at
about 3 . 3~ and 2.2~, the second being the weaker.
This pattern is relatively consistent (Wada, 1977;
Wells et al. , 1977; Webb and Fin la yson , 1984) but
not diagnostic .
The
best
analytical
technique
for
th e
identification of a ll ophane is IR spectroscopy,
and Fig . 2 shows IR spectra for a ll ophanes from
widely differing locations and parent materials.
Two peaks are diagnostic , one around 9S0-l000/cm
and the other at SSO - S80/cm .
The former peak is
due to Si - O stretching vibrations and the latter

Plate 2. Allophane flowstone , showing microgours , from South

Bald Rock Cave (locality as Plate 1).

Wilkinson (1950) reported allophane occurring

as a "rippled flow " on the limestone wal ls and
roof of a mine in Derbyshire, England .
The
deposit is amorp hous and composed largely of
alumina ,
silica ,
and water,
ao
it
probably
represents allophane , although there is some doubt
because
Wilkinson
(1950)
recorded
that
it
" dissolved instantaneously " in dilute hydrochloric
acid (all ophane does not react with this acid) .
In literature there are two descriptions of
speleothems which may have been allophane , though
not identified as such .
Halliday (1963, 1966)
described pasty, red - orange flowstone which he
identified as " cimolite"; it occ urred in several
marble caves in Washington State , U.S . A. Cimol ite
is a hydrous aluminium silicate but is no longer
recognised as a valid mineral name because
the
type example was
shown to be a mixture of
montmorillonite and alunite (Caillere and Henin ,
1963) .
Since Halliday did not describe the
analytical
techniques
it
is no t
possible to
comment further in this case.
Bartrum
(1930)
described
stalagmites and
stal actites from a lava cave in Auckland , New
Zealand; these were composed of al ter na ting layers
of opal and " strongly hydrated colloidal aluminous
material" .
No XRD or IR analyses wer e performed
on th e material, but it could have been allophane.
Hill
(1976),
in
the
standard
text
on
cave
mineralogy , makes no reference to allophane.
It
is possible that allophane may be more common in
speleothems than is presently realised and there
6

On the available evidence it would a ppe a r

tha t direct precipi ta tion of a ll o ph a ne is r a re.
White et al. (1963), in a comprehensive survey o f
subsurface waters and spring precipitates , did not
report any allophane deposits .

HISINGERITE AND FERRIHYDRITE

Hisingerite is an iron - rich n o n-crystallin e
hydrated silicate mineral with a variable SiD, :
Fe,O, ratio in the range of 2- 4.
It is amorphous
to X-rays but has a characteristic IR spectrum
(Henmi et al., 1980 ).
Ferrihydrite is an hydrated
iron oxide with a number of characteristics but
waek XRD peaks; it shows some variation in the
development
of
crystallinity
(Carlson
and
Schwertmann , 1981).
Wada (1982) has described
ferrihydrite as crystalline but with defects and
disorders .
Henmi
et al.
( 1980 )
described iron-rich
precipitates from springs in New Zealand ; these
precipitates were poorly ordered and ranged in
composition between ferrihydrite and hisingerite.
Henmi et al. (1980) suggested that this material
forms
as
a
co - precipitate
from
water
supersaturated with iron and silica .
Hisingerite and ferrihydrite are similar in
appearance
and
composition
to
limonite
and
goethite.
Many iron - rich speleothems have been
identified as limonite, which is a general field
term for a mixture of brown amorphous hydrous
ferric ox i des.
Goethite is generally the main
constituent of limonite , and Hill ( 1976) grouped
all
iron-rich
speleothems
together under the
heading of goethite and did not recognise other
species.
However,
ferrihydrite-hisingerite may
have been misidentified in speleothems in the same
way as allophane , and some spe l eothems originally
identified as limonite could well be composed of
ferrihydrite - hisingerite.
It would appear unwise
to indenti fy an iron - rich speleothem as goethite
unless t he presence of this mineral has been
verified , e . g . by XRD or IR analysis .
White
(1982)
identified
goethite
in
speleothems
from
limestone
caves
in
the
Appalachians.
However, his analyses indicate that
the material is in fact amorphous to X- rays and
has an IR spectrum substantially different from
that of goethite.
I t is more likely to belong to
the compos i tional series ferrihydrite - hisingerite
(cf. Henmi et al . , 1980) .
Lassak (1970) described limonitic speleothems
from the Hakwesbury Sandstones of the Sydney Basin
(Australia), but gave only compositional analyses
and no IR or X-ray spectra .
It is possible that
these
samples
also
belong
to
the
ferrihydrite-hisingerite group.
More
detailed
analyses
of
iron - rich
speleothems need to be undertaken ; XRD , IR and
compositional analyses
(especially the SiD,
Fe,O,
ratios) would be most useful .
The XRD
analysis will indicate whether or not the sample
is crystalline and , if not,
IR analysis and
composition
will
enable
more
precise
identification.

1cm

'------'

Smm

Plate 3. Allophane stalactite from Church Cave, a lava cave

near Byaduk , western Victoria.
A : side view .
B: crosssection , showing banding.

is a clear need for more rigorous

non - crystalline speleothems.

analysis

of

Formation of Allophane Speleothems

Little is known of the mode of formation of
al l ophane speleothems .
Most allophanes described
in the literature are from soils (e . g . F ieldes ,
1966 ; Wada, 1977) and they are usually considered
to
be
alteration
products
of
primary
alumino - silicates or volcanic glass.
In order to
form
speleothems ,
allophane
must
precipi tate
directly
from
solution;
two
well-documented
instances of this have been reported in the
literature .
Wells et al. ( 1977 ) identified a creamy-white
allophane deposit in the stream bed below Silica
Springs on Mount Ruapehau , New Zealand.
The
springs
issue
from
an
andesitic
lava
flow .
Precipitation of allophane at this site was
be l ieved to be due to a rise in pH downstream of
the spring, caused by outgassing of CO,.
Webb and Finlayson (1984) described allophane
flowstone (P1.3 ) in a granite cave ; this flows t one
was being precipitated by water issuing from a
horizontal joint in the cave wall .
The joint
systems from which the water is flowing are
vegetated at the ground surface above the cave ,
and so contain humic acids and soil CO"
which
promote the solution of alumina colloids . A rise
in pH , due to CO, outgass ing, would be expected
when the water emerges into the cave , leading to
the selective precipitation of aluminosilicate gel
(i . e . allophane).

CONCLUSIONS
This
survey has shown that there is a
predisposition in the
literature
towards
the
identification
of
speleothem
minerals
as
crystalline phases, even where analyses indicate
that this is not the case .
Moreover, speleothem
minerals have frequently been identified without
adequate structural analysis .
In this paper the
main areas where confusion can arise have been
indicated and diagnostic procedures suggested.
Correct identification of speleothem minerals is
important for determining their mode of formation
and the conditions prevailing in the cave at the
time of formation.
Three groups of amorphous minerals have been
discussed and appropriate diagnostics tests ha ve
been indicated in each case.
Opal speleothems
should be indentified using X- ray diffraction ;
allophane speleothems can be indentified initially
using the test of Fieldes and Perrott (1966 ) and
7

then confirmed with IR spectroscopy ; iron - rich

speleothems should be analysed initially using
X- ray diffraction and , if amorphous to X- rays ,
further investigated using I R spectroscopy .
In
all cases it is important that as much analytica l
information as possible , both composi ti onal and
structural , is presented to demonstrate that a
correct
identification has been made and to
facilitate comparisons with other occurrences.
It
is clear from the literatur e that many speleo t hem
mineral identifications have been made on t he
basis of indequate and sometimes mis - i n t e r preted
data .

Swartzlow, C . L., and Keller , W. O., 1937.

Corralloidalopal .
J. Geol., vol. 45 , 101 - 108 .
Wada , K. , 1977 . Allophane and imogolite; in Dixon , J.B. &
Weed, S . B. (eds ) Minerals in soi l env i ronme nts . Soil
science society of America , Madison , pp . 603 - 638.
Wada , K., 1980. Mineralogical chracterist i cs of andisols ; in
Theng , B . K.G. (ed.) soils with variable charge. N. Z. Soc.
Soil . Sci. , Lower Hutt , pp. 87 - 107 .
Wada , K. , 1982. Amorphous Clay minerals - chemical
composition , crys t a l l i ne s t ate , synthesis and surface
properties . Proc. 7th Inter. Clay Con f . , pp. 385 - 398 .
Wada. , K., and Greenland , D. J . , 1970 . Selective dissolution
and differential infrared spectroscopy for
characterisation of "amorphous " constituents in soils .
Clay Min. , Vo l. 8 , pp . 2 4 1- 25 4 .
Weaver , C. E. , and Po ll a r d , L.D. , 1973 . The chemistry of clay
minerals.
Dev . Sediment ., vol . 15 , pp . 1- 213.
Elsevier ,
Amsterdam .
Webb, J.A ., and Finlayson , B . L ., 1984. Allophane and opal
speleothems from granite caves in southeast Queens l and .
Aust. , J. Earth sci ., vo l . 31 . pp . 341 - 349 .
Wells , N. , Childs , C.W. , and Downes , C.J ., 1977 .
Silica
Springs , Tongariro Na t ional Park, New Zealand - analysis
of the spring water and characteristation of the
alumino - sil icate deposit .
Geochim. Cosomchim. Acta .,
vol. 41 , pp . 1497- 1506 .
Whi t e , D.E. , Hem , J. D. , and Waring , GoA., 1 963 .
Data of
geochemistry , Chapter F , Chemical composition of
subsurface waters .
U.S . Geol. Surv . Prof . Pap ., 440 - F ,
pp . 1- 67 .
White , W. B . , 1976.
Cave minerals and speleothems; in Ford ,
T . D. & Cullingford , C.H . D. (eds ) The science of
speleology. Acade mi c Press, London , pp. 267 - 238 .
White , W. B., 1982 . Mi ne r alogy of the But le r Cave - Sinki ng
Creek System.
Na t. Spe l eo l . Soc . Bil l ., vol. 44 , pp.
90 - 9 7 .
Wild i ng , L.P. , Smeck , N.E . and Drees , L . R. , 1977 . Silica in
soils: quartz , cr i stoba l ite, tr i dymi te a nd opal ; in
Dixon , J . B. & Weed , S . B . (eds ) Mi nera l s in soil
environments . Soil Scie nce Soc i ety of America , Madison,
pp. 471 - 552.
Wilkinson , P. , 1950 . Allophane from Derbyshire . Clay
Minerals Bull. , vol. 1 , no. 4 , pp . 122- 123 .
Young, A. W. , Campbell , A . S . , and Walker , T.W . , 1980 .
Allophane isolated from a podsol developed on a
non - vitric parent material.
Nature , vol. 284 , pp . 46 - 48.

REFERENCES
Bartrum , J .A . , 1930.
Unusual depostional stalactites in a
lava tunnel at Mount Albert, Auckland , N. Z. J. Sci.
Tech., vol. 1, pp . 188 - 192 .
Bates, R.L ., and Jackson, J.A . (eds) , 1980. Glossary of
geology, second editio n . American Geological
Institute, Viglni a , 805 pp.
Broughton , P . L . , 1974.
Silica deposits in eastern Wyoming
caves . Nat . Speleol. Soc. Bull. , vol. 36 (3 ) , pp . 9- 1l.
Brydon , J . E., and Day, J . H., 1970.
Use of the Fieldes and
Perrott sodium fluor ide test to distinguish the B
horizons of podzols in the field.
Can. J. soil sci.,
vol. 50, pp . 35 - 4l.
Calliere, 5. , and Henin, 5., 1963.
Mineralogie des argiles.
Masson et Cie , Paris.
Carlson, L . , and Schwertmann , U"
1981 . Natural ferrihydrites
in surface deposits from Finland and their association
with si l ica.
Geochim .
Cosmochim.
Acta , Vol . 45 , pp.
421 - 429 .
Cody , A. , 1980. " Stalgmite deflosits in Auckland lava caves .
N. Z. speleol. Bull., vol. 6, pp . 337 - 343 .
Dana, E . S., 1982 .
System of minerology, sixth edition .
Wiley, New Yor k .
Davis , S.N., 1964 .
Silica in streams and ground water . Am .
J. sci., vol. 262, pp . 870 - 891.
Eitel , W. , 1954.
The physical chemistry of the silicates.
University of Chicago Press , Chicago , 1592 pp .
Fieldes, M. , 1966.
The nature of allophane in soils.
Part 1 .
Significance of structural randomnes in pedogenesis .
N.Z . J. s ci. , vol. 9 , pp . 599 - 607.
Fieldes , M. , and Perrott , K. W., 1966 . The nature of al10phane
in soils.
Part 3 .
Rapid field and l aborato ry test for
allophane.
N. Z. J . sci . , vol . 9, pp . 623.629 .
Frondel, C. , 1962.
Dana ' s System of Mineralogy . Volume 3 ,
Silica minerals .
Wiley , New York .
Frye , K., 1981.
The encyclopedia of mineralogy.
Hutchinson
Ross, Stroudsburg, 794 pp.
Garrels, R. M., and MacKenzie, F . T. , 1967.
Origin of the
chemica l compositions of some springs and lakes.
Advan c e s in Chemistry serie s , vo l . 67 , pp. 22 - 242 .
Hal l ida y, W. R., 1963 . Caves of Washington .
Wash . Dep.
Conserv . Div . Min . Geol. I nf. Circ ., vol . 40, pp. 1- 132 .
Halliday, W. R. , 1966. Cimolite? Nat . speleol. Soc . News, vol .
24, p . 58 .
Henmi, T., Wells, N., Childs , C.W . , and Parfitt , R. L. , 1980.
Poorly - ordered iron - rich precipitates from springs and
streams on andesitic volcanoes.
Geochim . Cosmochim .
Acta, vol. 44 , pp. 365 - 372.
Hill, C. A . , 1976 . Cave Minerals .
Nat. Speleol . Soc .
Huntsville , Alabama.
Jones , J.B ., Sanders, J . V., and Segnit , E.R., 1964.
Structur e
of opal.
Nature, vol. 204, pp . 990-991.
Jones, J.B . , and Segnit, E. R. , 1971 .
The nature of opal. 1.
Nomenclature and constituent phases.
J . geol . Soc .
Aust., Vol. 18, pp. 57 - 68.
Lassak, E.V . , 1970.
A note on some non - calcareous stalactites
from the sandstone of the sydney Basin, N. S.W. J. Proc .
Roy . Soc. N. S.\oJ., vol. 103, pp. 11-14.
Markova , M., 1978. Contribution to lussatite genesis.
I'-lin.
slav. , vol. 10, pp . 37 - 46 (Min. Abstr., vol. 30 , p . 417) .
Mason , B. , and Berry , L.G . , 1968.
Elements of Mineralogy .
Freeman, San Francisco.
Mizutani, S . , 1970.
Silica minerals in the early stage of
diagenesis . Sedimentology , vol . IS , pp . 419 - 436 .
Nakamoto, K., 1978.
Infrared and Raman spectra of inorganic
and coordination compounds.
3rd ed. Wiley, New York .
Plyusnina, 1 . 1 . , 1979.
Infrared spectra of opals.
Sov . Phys.
Dokl., vol. 24, pp . 332 - 333. (Min . Abstr . , vol. 31, p.
443) .
Porter, W. P ., 1979.
Opaline outgrowths on Lee Formation
Sandstones in Wis e County , Virginia .
Rocks and Min erals ,
vol. 54, pp. 97 - 100.
Pyman , M. A. F ., Knuiman, M., Armitage, T . M., & Posner, A.,
1979 .
Examination of the heterogeneity of amorphous
silicoaluminas and allophanes using the electron
microphone .
J. Soil. Sci. , vol . 30, pp. 333 - 345 .
Sanders, J . V., 1975 . Microstructure a nd crystallinity of gem
opals . Am . Min eralogist , vol. 60, pp. 749 - 757.
segnit , E.R . , stevens, T . J. and Jones, J . B., 1965. The role
of water in opal.
J. Geol. Soc. Aust ., vol . 12, pp.
211 - 226.
Siegel . F.R ., Mills , J . P . , and Pierce. J . W., 1968 . Aspectos
petrograficos y geoquim icos de espeleotemas de opalo y
calcita de la Cueva de la Bruja, Mendoza , Republica
Argentina.
Rev. Assoc . Geol. Argent . , vol. 23, pp. 5- 19.

Received Novembe r 198 4

B.L . Finlayson,
Depa r tment of Geography ,
University of Mellbourne ,
Parkville,
Victoria ,
Au st ra l ia.
3052 .

J.A. Webb ,
Department of Geology ,
University of Melbourne ,
Parkv i lle ,
Victoria ,
Aus t ra l ia . 3052 .

CAVE SCIENCE Vol . 12 , No.1, March 1985

Transactions of the British Cave Research Association

Speleology in the U.S.S.R.

V.N. DUBLYANSKY,

A. B. KLIMCHOUK AND V.E . KISSELYOV

Abstract : Major cave exploration s during the period 1978 to 1984 in the
various cave regions of Russia are briefly described.
The most important
progress has been made in the high massifs of the Caucasus , where very deep
caves have been discovered.
Dye testing has proved a drainage system 2200m
deep and Snezhnaya cave is 1370m deep.
There is spectacular potential for
future exploration .
The National Association of Soviet Speleologists
coordinates research and exploration.

The following descriptions briefly cover the

major explorations and discoveries i n the various
regions over the last seven years.

INTRODUCTION
The vast land area of the USSR contains 26
cave regions which group into 12 large cave areas
(Fig.l).
Within these regi ons , a total of 5500
caves had been recorded by September 1984 and over
500 of these were discovered and explored since
1978.
The monograph by Dublyansky and Ilukhine
( 1982) contained descriptions and surveys of all
the largest caves, more than 5km long or 200m
deep, known up to 1980. Since then the Commission
on Largest Cavities (of the National Association
of Soviet Speleologists - NASS ) has collated data
on all caves over 500m long or 100m deep.
By
September 1984, there were 402, and Table 1 shows
the distribution of these.
It is noticeable that
the Caucasus Mountains are of prime importance for
their large concentration o f the deepest known
caves ,
while
the outs t anding
feature 0 f
the
distribution of the longest caves is the group of
gypsum caves in t he Dnestr
Black Sea region.
Tables 2 and 3 list the longest and deepest caves
of Russia fr om the current NASS records.

VALDAY - KULOY REGION

This region in the northern part of European
Russia has a number of long caves.
The most
important
are
Kulogorskaya
(7195m) ,
Konstitutsionnaya
(5880m), Olimpiyskaya
( 5500m )
and Leningradskaya
(3400m),
all
developed
in
Permian gypsum within the basin of the Pinega
River.
There are another 22 caves in the reg ion
each with over a kilometre of explored passage.
DNESTR - BLACK SEA REGION
This region encompasses most of the Ukraine
and is best known for the remarkable gypsum caves
around Podoliya.
The longest gypsum cave in the
world is Optimisticheskaya with a
length of
151.3 km by 1984 , while Ozernaya has 105 . 3 km of
mapped
passage.
Both
are
complex,

of the USSR

Speleo log ic al areas

Speleolog ical regions

Figure 1
1

2
3

4
5
6

Valday-Kuloy
Kamsk-Srednevolzh
Prikaspy
Dnestr - Black Sea
North Ural
Middle Ural

7
8
9
10
11
12
13

So uth Ural
East Carpathian
Crimea
Great Caucasus

Lesser Caucasus
Turkffien - Khorasan
Ustyurt - Mangyshlak

14
15
16
17
18
19
20

Tien Shan
Gissar Alay
Pamir-Tadj ik
Altay
Salair - Kuznet
Sayan
Tuvin

21
22
23
24
25
26
27

Leno-Enisey
Baikal
Zabajkal
Dzhug -Dzhur

Pr i amur
Primer
Sakhalin

Number

Region
Great Caucas us:
NW & N Caucasus
W Caucasus
Lesser Caucasus
Crimea
Dnestr - Black Sea

Valday-Kuloy
Ural
Pamir - Tien Shan
Siberia
Far East
Total

Longer than

Deeper than

of caves
42
127
2
46
13
37
52
32
31
10
402

100m

200

24
96

8
38

500

500m

1000
16
29

14

31
64
2
15
13
37
51
18
28
8
267

40
7
23
11
2
203

5
2
60

5000

100 00

1
11

22
33
12
15
4
149

6
3
5
2
3
23

12

Table 1 Distr ibuti on of deep and long caves in the USSR

Cave

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27

Depth

Massif

Snezhnaya -Mezhonnogo

Napra
Kievskaya

V. Ilyukhin
Pionerksaya
Kuybyshevskaya

Bzybsky
Bzybsky

C
C

KyrKtau
Arabika

Bzybsky
Arabika

C
C
C
C

V.Pantyukhin

Bzybsky

Ural ' skaya

Forel'naya

Bajsuntau T
C
C
C
C
Karabi
K
Dzhentu
C
Bzybsky
C
Alek
C
Bzybsky
C
Bzybsky
C
Akhtsu
C
Arabika
C
Bzybsky
C

Bzybsky
Alek
Fisht
Alek

Ruchcejnaya - Zabludshikh
Paryashchaya Ptitsa
Osennyaya - Nazarovskaya
Soldatskaya
Mayskaya
Nocturne

Oktyabr'skaya
Aleksinsk
Souvenir
Nezhdannaya

Akhtiarskaya
Vesennaya
Kaskadnaya
Genrikhova Bezdna

Studentcheskaya

Table 2

T = Tien

Arabika

C
C
C
C
C

Bzybsky
Alek

Shkol'naya
Absolutnaya
Geoqraficheskaya
C = Caucasus

Aj-Petri

Lagonaki

Alek
Shan

13 70
956
950
950
800
740
650
565
550
540
535
500
500
500
462
450
450
430
420
410
403
400
360
350
320
317
310

Length m

19
3
1
4
1
2
1
2

000
170
820
000
350
020
210
500
900
500
290
500
100
110
460
650
800
950
930
800
230
980
550
800
560
420
100

K = Crimea

The deepest caves of the USSR

Plate 2

Rift passage in Opt imisticheskaya

Cave

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13

Op ti misticheskaya
Ozernaya

zolushka
Kristal'naya
Snezhna ya -Mezhonnogo
Bol'shaya Oreshnaya

Mlynki

Krasnaya
Guardakskaya
Kap - Kutan
Vorontsovskaya
Yaschchik Pandory
Sumgan - Kutuk
14 Div'ya
15 Verteba
16 Kizelovskaya

17
18
19
20
21
22
23

Plate 1

Solution features in Optimisticheskaya

gypsum cave

Kulogorskaya
Kinderlinskaya
Osennyaya - Nazarovskaya

Badzhejskaya
Konsti t uts ion naya
Kungurskaya

Olimpijskaya

Table 3
10

Region
Dnes tr Black Sea
Dnestr Black Sea
Dnestr Black Sea
Dnestr Black Se a
Great Caucasus

Sayan
Dnestr Black Sea
Crimea
Gissar -Al ay
Gissar - Alay
Great Caucasus
Salair - Kuznetsky
Ural
Ural
Dnestr Black Sea

Ural
Valday - Kuloy
Ural
Grea t Causcaus
Sayan

Va lda y - Kuloy
Ural
Valday-K uloy

The Longest caves of the USSR

Length m

151
105
80
22
19
18
18
13
11
11
10
10
9
9
7
7
7
6
6
6
5

300
300
000
000
000
000
000
130
010
000
640
000
860
720
820
600
195
700
500
000
880
5 600
5 500

Depth
20
20
20
10
1370
190
10
+135
72
155
240
180
130
28
10
45
11
110
500
170
32
23
27

The gypsum c ave o f Zo lush ka is be ing ac ti ve ly

explored and curr e ntly e xten ds t o a len g th of
80km .
It is not a ble f o r the l a rge dimensi o ns of
many chambers and p a ss a ges an d th e re a r e g oo d
prospects for further disc ove ri e s; a ma j o r ne w
are a of passages was f o und in summer 1984 .
An
in teresting feature of Zolushka is that it is a
phre a tic cave only dr a ined within the l a st 40
years by artificial l o we rin g o f th e l o c a l wa ter
table.
New explorations have als o been made in the
next two longest caves in the a rea - Krist a lnay a
and Mlynki .
The Dnestr - Bl ac k Se a regi o n tak e s
first place in the USSR for th e total length of
explored caves .
The five main gypsum cave s total
376.6 km of passages ; a further 16.5 km of passag e
has been mapped in a n o ther six c a ves in the
region .

joint - controlled ,
two - dimensional
maze
caves
formed in thin beds of Upper Tertiary gypsum .
In
the ten years up to 1983 , exploration of Ozernaya
was restricted by a high groundwater level which
submerged
most
of
the
maze
passages .
The
existence of a connection between these two great
caves was often suggested in the literature, but
the results of recent work now indicate that a
connection is most unlikely to exist .

CRIMEA REGION
Limestone mountains form the southern pa rt of
the Crimea peninsula , projecting into the Black
Sea .
The Krasnaya cave remains the longest with
13.130m of passage, while th e Solda tskaya sha ft
system is the deepest at - 500m .
I n the last few
years new sections have been discovered in the
Emine-Bair-Coba cave
( 800m long)
and
in th e
Emine - Bair - Khosar
(1460m ) ,
and
the
phreatic
complex of the Chernaya Cave has been surveyed t o
Deeper explorations include
a length of 1160m .
those of the
Kaskadnaya
(-400m)
and
Druzhba
(-2 70m ) shaft systems .
GRAND CAUCASUS REGION

Plate 3

The Caucasus Mountains, stretching between

the Black and Caspian Seas , have seen the most
important cave explorations in the USSR over the
last
10
years .
The
Western
Caucasus,
and
especially the Abkhasia area , t a kes first place in
the USSR for both the depth and the number 0 f
deep caves . Th e Bzybsky, Arabika and Alek massifs
contain most of the deep caves , and are described
below .
Elsewhere in the Caucasus , the re hav e als o
be en
significant recent discoveries .
On
th e
Dzhentu range, in N. W. Caucasus , the Mayskaya
shaft system has been explored to a sump at -500m;
it is developed in limestone but also cuts down
into underlying chlorite schists, and below the
depth of 260m has many mirabilite and gypsum
formations.
On
the
high
Fisht ma ssif ,
the
Paryashchaya Ptitsa pothole was explored to a sump
at -5l5m in 1978, and then in Summer 1983 the sump
was dived to a depth of 20m over a length of 50m .

Pas s age in Zo lushk a gyp sum cave

Plate 4
Passage in Zolushka gypsum cave
11

Alek Massif
Within a single karst drainage system , eigh t
potholes have been
explored each to dep ths of
over
200m .
An
important
discovery
was
the
connection between the Zabludshikh and Rucheynaya
potholes , creating a single system 540m deep and
2500m long.

at an al titude of SOm , with a flow of 2.5 cumecs .

In add iti on the tracer was found in a borehole
situated between the two springs; t his in dicated
an underground flow from the system to submarine
resurgences known near the coast at depths of
- 40m.
This therefore is the world's deepest known
karst drainage s ystem , with a vertical rang e of
arround 2200m.
The V . Iljukhin cave (Fig 2 . ) was exp l ored
during
1981 - 84
by
cavers
from
Moscow
and
elsewhere .
I t has two entrances at altitudes of
2318m and 2300m .
A labyrinth of meanders and
shafts extends to a dep th of 300m ; below this,
three branches ex t end , of which two have just been
followed t o - 400m .
The main branch was explored
in 1983 to - 600m , and then in 1984 to - 950m .
From
the 700m level i t follows a single stream (with a
flow of 20 to 40 litres /second ) to a sump ; though
th is is the pre s ent limit of explorati on , there
are high hopes for futur e progress to greater
depths.
The Kuybyshevskaya pothole was e xpl ored to
- 740m by Kiev cavers , also during 1981 - 84 (Fig .

Arabika Massif
It is this area which has yie ld ed the mos t
in t erest ing discoveries in t he l as t fou r years ,
and there are high hopes for major explorations i n
the fu ture.
I n 1980 only two caves deeper than
200m were known here .
By 1984, eleven more had
been found , i nclud i ng the V.Il jukh i n (- 950m ) and
Kuybyshevskaya (- 740m ) systems .
In summer 1984 , underground water tracing was
carried out on Arabika , and a spectacular result
was
obta i ned
when
d ye
was
p l aced
in
the
Kuybyshevskaya cave at an altitude of 2180m .
The
dye was recovered in the Reproa spring - a t an
altitude of 2m , with a flow ranging from 1.5 to 3
cumecs - and also in the Holodnaya Rechka spring -

SYSTEM BY V. ILJUKHIN
(massif IIrabil<a, West Cau cas us)
Oepth 9S0m
DevelOp. 4 km
0

~\

100

150
200

250
~oo

350

I
I

"

~oo

~oo

~w

700
750

o,

{O

tpOm

3ump

800
~50

900
950

Survey : Perovskiy Speleo Club from Mosl<ow , /9831984

Figure 2
12

Figure 3

KUYBYSHEVSKAYA
(massif IIrabika . West Caucas us )
Depth 740m Deve Lop.2.D2 km

-0- [Entrance

PLAN

pogO

SO

SCiences

I,

100

~
_
p-60~~

ISO

-150" _

- ~ ____ '~ P-t~

meand~
~~I 1

200

- 210

-280

i~

250
JOO

P-70

350
50

450

fOO

150 m

of Kiev
1500 ye ars

500

chokes

550
600

/--~1

chokes /

,Academy of Sciences
Chamber

,,<P'o~

fi50
700

-7'+0

750

'\

"- ~

to Reproa spring. 2 m a.s. L.

Survey : Spe/eo-C/ub of Kiev, 1981-1983

drop which is the deepest in the USSR .

This
lands in the Chamber of Kiev 1500 Years, which has
a volume of 600 , 000 cub i c metres ; below th e 570m
level, the cave is a descending streamway (wi th a
flow of 20-50
litres/second ),
complicated by
boulder
chokes.
There
are
many
tribut ary
passages , one of which has been explored upstream
over a vertical range of 150m .
The second large
chamber
Academy of Sciences Chamber
ha s a
volume of 1 50,000 cubic metres and is situated
above the t erminal boulder choke .
This was
exp l ored to a depth of 740m in 1983 , but three
weeks of work in 1984 made no further progress and
the prospects do not appear to be good.
Two caves are known in the right bank of the
Gega River , which forms the western boundary of
Arabika .
Both have been exp l ored by cave d ivers
fr om Krasnoyarsk .
The Gegskaya cave has five
sumps and a total length of 2000m .
The Gegskiy
Waterfall cave has been explored upstream , through
two sumps for 350m , climbing 100m .

3) .
I t starts in a Lower Cretaceous limestone
which becomes more and more sandy at depth, and
below the 570m level t he cave is deve loped in a
calcareous sandstone . The upper part of th e cave
is dominated by deep shafts , including a 170m

Plate 5

Bzybsky Massif
In the western part of the Bzybsky range
about 20 deep caves have been exp l ored in the l ast
few years .
A major d iscovery of the Kr asnoyarsk
cavers is the Napra pothole (Fi g . 4 ), exp l ored
during 1980-83 to a depth of 956m .
The en tra nce
is in a small sinkhole, 50m from the summit of
Napra mountain .
The u pper part of the cave is a
sequence o f narrow shafts developed on a sy st em of
tectonic fissures which have been additionally
widened
by
small
flows
of
snow,
rain
and
condensation origin.
At a depth of 670m , the
first boulder choke is a tectonic rift filled with

Decorated passage in the Archery cave

13

Figure 4

mt. Napra

NAPRA
(13zybskiy range. West Caucasus)
Depth 956 m De velop . 3170 m

50

~oo

150

200

PLAN

250
300

400

sump

500
550

Chamber

600
650

choke 1
700
750

choke 2

800

900

SUllIp

Vysobkiy
Chamber

950

Survey : Spe/eo .Club of I<rasnoyarSI<. 1982-1983

the Snezhnaya cave system. This has been explored

by the Moscow caves and is now the deepest cave in
the USSR (Fig. 5) . The entrance is at an altitude
of 1900m and to a depth of 190m the shafts are
partly occupied by an estimated 50,000 cubic
metres of snow and ice (the name means Snow Cave) .
A series of shafts , the deepest being 160m ,
continue down to meet the main cave river at
- 650m; this has a flow ranging from 0 . 3 to 2 . 0
cumecs (Ludk ovs ky, 1981).
The river passage is
complicated by many bou l der chokes, above which
lie large chambers, and these chokes have form ed
the limits of exploration in successive years .
In
1981 , a choke finally stopped progress at - 1335m
and, despite major efforts in following years ,
this choke has still not been passed.
Also in
1981 , various tributaries were explored and the
river passage was
followed a
short dist ance
upstream . Then in 1983 a connection was made with
the Mezhonnogo pothole, then 630m deep.
This
added 35m to the depth of the combined system,
which now has a length of about 19 km and a depth
of 1370m.

breakdown; it was dug through to a short passsage

and a second similar choke . Beyond this, a stream
with a flow of 100 litres/second is joined, and
the streamway is followed to where the water
filters through a sand and gravel choke at a depth
of 956m.
On the 1982 expedition , two tributaries
were explored to sumps and one to an aven , and
digging failed to remove the termainal choke .
In
August
1983,
divers
explored
tributary sumps
reaching a depth of 22m, 50m into one of them , and
stopping at a constriction 15m into the other.
Other large caves discovered in this part of
the massif include Pionerskaya (- 800m in 1984),
Forelnaya
(about
-55 0m
in
1984) ,
Vesennaya
(-4 03m ), Studentcheskaya (- 350m) and Belorusskaya
(- 250m) . Probably all of these caves combine with
Napra in a single karst drainage system feeding
the powerful Mchishta resurgence which has a mean
flow of 9 cumecs; cave divers from Krasnoyarsk
have dived this for 60m , to a depth of 30m. Among
other caves in the massif, the Nocturne pothole
was discovered and explored by Krasnoyarsk cavers,
to -462m; the shaft system of V. Pantyukhin was
explored , by cave rs from Simeropol and Perm, to a '
horizontal passage and a sump at -650m; in the
northeast part of Bzybsky, the Aleks insky pot hole
has been explored to a sump at -450m.
The eastern part of Bzybsky is known as the
Khipsta massif, and is notable because it contains

Editor's note :
While this paper was in press, a new discovery was
reported, taking the depth of Snezhnaya to 1470 rn.
14

+35
Serenade

PLAN

Snezhnaya Mezhonnogo
Cave System
West Caucasus USSR
1912 - 1984
Choke 7
Record Cascade

Clay Choke

-1320...c:::.o"--"

500m

-1335

SECTION

Mezhonnogo Entrance

Snezhnaya Entrance

Big
S haft
University Hall

~535

. ..r---..,.,.,,,..,....- ~~~~J.'>-_ _ _ _- - '

------- ---- . _----- .. -; '

Roaring Cascad~_ .

Choke 7

,"

Deep River

Dolmen Hall

Record Cascade -940

~ . A-~------------~CI-a-y-C--hOke

~
"'

....... ..

Olympic Cascade

\. __ .

F i g ur e 5

Plate 6

LESSER CAUCASUS REGION

Decorated passage
in the Archery cave

More
discoveries
have
been made
in
the
sou thwestern part of the Gissar mountain range.
On the Baj sun tau massif , Sverdlovsk cavers have
explored the Uralskaya cave to - 580m.
It starts
with a series of deep shafts which drop a total of
317m through Upper Jurassic limestones .
From this
depth there is a 2200m l ong active streamway
developed along a single gently inclined bedding
plane at the boundary between the limestone and
the underlying impermeable rock .
On the Kugitangtau range, explorations have
continued in large horizontal caves in both gypsum
and
limestone ;
the main caves
are
Kap - Kutan
(11 , OOOm) ,
Promezhutochnaya
(4500m)
and
Khashim-Oiyk (3200m).
In the Gaurdakskaya cave ,
the Kiev cavers have mapped over 11 km of passages
(Fig. 6) .
All of these caves are notable for the

This small region consists of the Malyykavkaz

mountains,
south of Tibilisi,
in Armenia .
A
number of limestone caves, discovered in the last
few years in the Arpa River basin , are notable for
their rich and varied speleothems.
One of them is
the
Archery
cave
containing
about
3000 m of
inclined bedding plane passages with a ver t ical
range of 120m.
PAMIR AND TIEN SHAN REGIONS
This complex of mountains , right at the heart
of Asia , contain various areas of karst .
On the
Kyrktau
massif ,
exploration of
the
Kievskaya
(- 950m) and other potholes has continued.

GAURDAKSKAYA

CAVE

(S -W Tian - Shan, Middle ASia)

Depth 72 m Develop . if km

SO

Survey : Institute of Geol. Sci. of Uk.,.. Acad. of Sci. , 1982

Figure 6
16

fOO

(SOm

exceptional
richness
and
dive rsity
of
the ir
dripstone and crystal f o rmat i on s .
On the h i gh mountain range of Peter Pe rvyi ,
some gypsum caves have been e xpl o red by th e Kiev
cavers and o ne of them ha s been ascended o ver a
ve rtic a l range of 126m .

study in the USSR .

I n 1978 NASS became a member
of the International Union o f Speleology and has
restructured its o rg an is ation to conform with VIS .
New
commissions
have
been
created
for
biospeleology ,
speleomed i cine
and
spe l eoar cheo log y .
NASS is a lso invo lved in th e
international programme on chemical
denudation ,
has prepa r ed lists of the longest and deepe st
cav es in the USSR and periodically
collects
abstracts
of
So viet
ka rst
and
spe1eology
lite rature f o r the Spe l eological Abstracts of VIS .
Soviet speleolog ists have part ici pa t ed i n
inter n a tion al me e tings
in Poland,
Jugoslavia,
Hung a r y , Bulgari a a nd Czechoslovakia since 1978 .
They have had e x pedit i ons to the Sof Omar Cave i n
Ethop ia in 1983 and 1984 , and a re preparing an
internation al symposium on the karst of mountain
regions to be he ld in Tbilis i and Sukhumi in 1986 .
A. Eraso from Spai n , R. Gurnee fr om USA and H.
Trimmel
fr om
Austria
have
visited
karst
i n stitutions and regi o ns as guests of the Academy
of Sciences o f the US SR .
All - Union
Karstology
and
Spe l eo logy
Congresse s have been held - the Second in 1978 at
Sukhumi , Ca ucasus , and the Third in 1982 a t
Al ushta , Cr i mea . At each mee ting th e organisation
and r e search activity of Sovie t speleologists was
reviewed , a nd special topics were also di scuss ed
annually .
The l a tter included the utilis a ti on of
ca ves , the inve stigation of th e Pamir - Tien Shan
karsts ,
forec as t i ng
and
modelling
of
karst
processes,
cave deposits of calcareous
tufa ,
mi croc l imates of karst massifs , and eng i nee ring
geological r e se a rch on karst , etc.

ALTAY AND SAYAN REGION S

Thes e regions li e in the mountains of s o uthern
Siberia.
The survey has been con t inued o f the
Oreshnaya cave (Fig . 7 ) which with 18 km o f
passage
is
the
world ' s
longest
cave
in
conglomerate .
The Lys an skaya resurgence has been
explored by th e
Krasnoyarsk cave divers who have
passed six sumps with a t o tal length of 400m .
In
the Kuzn et sky Alatau , the Yashchik Pandor y cave
has been d i scovered and exp l o red for 10 . 1 km to
date.
FAR EAST REGI ON
During the l ast few ye a rs , abou t 200 c av es
have been found in this r egion .
Mo s t are sma ll ,
but
e i ght
are
longe r
t han
500m ,
inlc u d i ng
Prosh a ln aya ( 2700m ) . Only two caves exceed depths
of 100m
So l yanik
(- 122m ) and , on Sakhalin
Isla nd, Kaskadniy Proval (-1 23m ).
THE NATIONAL AS SOCIATION
The
Na t ion a l
Spel eo l og ists (NASS )

of
Soviet
Association
i s the senior body of cave

ORESHNAYA CAVE
(East Saya n . Siberia)
Depth 190 m

Oe vel op . 18 km
N

PLAN

o
L '_ _

50

100

L-~'L-~~'

200 m

__~~'

Surve y: Spe/eo.C / ub of Kra snoyars k . 1970-1983

Figure 7
17

In the period 1978 - 84 , general

monographs
were published on caving techniques (Dublyansky ,
1981 ) ,
alpine
karst
hydrogeology
(Dubl yansky ,
1984 ), explorations in the largest caves of the
USSR (Dubl yansky , 1982) , and also on the methods
of
speleological
investigations.
Regional
monographs were published on the caves of the
Ukraine
(Dublyansky,
1980) ,
the West Caucasus
(Tintilozov,
1976),
the Tien Shan
(Klimchouk ,
1981) , the Altay and Sayan (T sykine , 1979) and
also the Far East .
Current issues of " Peshchery"
(Caves )
and
"Hydr ogeologia
i
Karstovedenie"
(H ydrogeology and Karstology) were published and
contained articles
on caves in various regions ,
problems
of
speleogenesis ,
microclimates ,
secondary deposit s etc .

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authors gratefully acknowledge J . R.Middleton and
A.C . Waltham for their assistance in preparation of this
manuscript.
REFERENCES
Dublyansky, V. N. , et al , 1977, Speleology in the USSR between
the VI and VII International Speleological Congresses.
UIS Bull., vol.2, no.16, p.22 - 24.
Dublyansky, V.N. and Lomaiev, A,A. ,

Ukraine . Kiev, IBOpp.

Dublyansky, V.N. and Ilukhine, V. V.,
expeditions. Moscow, 192pp.
Dublyansky , V. N. and Ilukhine, V.V. ,
caves and potholes of the USSR .
Dublyansky , V.N. and Kiknadze, T.Z.,

1980, Karst caves of the

1981, Underground
1982 , The largest karst
Moscow , 136pp.
1984, Hydrogeology of

karst of alpine folded regions. MOscow ,

140pp.

K1imchouk , A. B. et al, 1981, Karst of the Kyrktau massif

(Tien Shan) . Kiev, 56pp.
Ludkovsky , G.V. et aI, 1981 , On research of Snezhnaya - the
deepest karst cave of the USSR (West Caucasus). Doklady

an SSSR, vol. 259, pp 437-442.

Tintilozov ,

Z.K .,

1976,

Karst caves of Georgia . Tbilisi ,

276pp.
Tsykine, R.A. et aI , 1979, Caves of Altay-Sayan mountain
region. Krasnoyarsk , 163pp .

Received December 1984

A.B . Klimchouk,
Institute of Geological Sciences ,
55B , Chka10v Street ,
Kiev 54 ,
252054 USSR

18

CAVE SCIENCE Vol . 12, No . 1 , March 1985

Transactions of the British Cave Research Association

B.C.R.A. Cave Science Symposium, November 1984

Abstracts of papers presented at the meeting
University of Sheffi e ld , November 1984

DISSOLUTION BEDFORMS IN KARST CONDUITS

CAVE SEDIMENTS AND THEIR BEARING ON THE EVOLUTION

OF PEAK DISTRICT CAVES

S . J.Ga l e,; CCAT, Cambridge CB1 IPT

A wide range o f dissolution bedforms are found
within karst conduits . The development of several
of
these ,
including
scallops,
f l utes
and
paragenetic rock pendants , has been simulated
under laboratory conditions.
The result of this
work indicate that the formation of these features
is largely a product of the hydraulic conditions
under which they develop.
I t has therefore been
possible to investigate such features in the field
in order to establish the hydraulic conditions
under which conduit flows o ccur .

KARST HYDROLOGICAL STUDIES IN DERBYSHIRE

John
Gunn;
Department
of
Environmental
Geographical Studies , Manchester Polytechnic

and

The purpose of this paper is to outl i ne Gurrent

and planned r esea rch on the hydrology of karst in
Derbyshire and to suggest that a Peak District
Karst Hydrology Research Programme be established.
Current
research
is
primarily
qualitative
wate r- trac i ng experiements designed to establish
sink
r i sing connections and to explore the
inte r nal
hydr o logy
of
caves .
Areas
under
investigation are Lathkilldale
(Wendy Emmett) ,
Upper Wye
(Joanne Gilman), Perry foot Swallets
(Keith Bentham) and Castleton (John Gunn).
The
focus for future research is the Castleton area
where au t ographic rainguages , crest and continuous
stage recorders , and four - channel data loggers
(pH , conducti v i ty, temperature , stage) are being
installed in the Pe ak -Speedwell cave system in
orde r t o monitor system response to recharge . The
aims include comparison of al logenic and autogenic
systems,
investigati on of vadose an d phreatic
hydrology, and the development of computer based
mathematica l models .
As many areas of the Peak
District
are
still
poorly
understood
hydrologically
it is
suggested that a research
programme be established , the first aim being to
establish connections between all known sinks and
risings.
Interested
persons
are
invited
to
contact the author who can make available the
necessary
dyestuffs
and
will
undertake
the
spectrofluorometric analysis of water
samples
and/o r activated charcoal detectors .

Department of

Ge ology ,

University

of

Mineralogical examinat i on of Peak District cave

sediments shows that the allochthonous fraction
has been derived mainly from the Namurian and
Triassic strata which surround the outcrop of the
Derbyshire
Carboniferous
Limestone
and
from
superficia l
loess deposits .
Scanning electron
microscope
studies
show that
many of
these
sediments
have
been
transported
under
fluv i o -gl acial conditions . Palaeomagnetic studies
of fluvio - glacial sediments from the Matlock area
show that they have consistently reversed remanent
magnetisation with a reversed to normal transition
towards the top of one section .
This may be
equated to the Brunhes/Matuyama transition at
730 kyr. BP . .

ELECTRON SPIN RESONANCE DATING OF CAVE CALCITE

B. W. Smith, M.C.R. Symons ; Department of Chemistry
University of Leicester
P.L . Smart ; Department of Geography, University of
Bristol
As soon as a speleothem has formed , environmenta l
radiation causes electrons to be trapped at
irregularities in the calcite crystal lattice .
The rate o f trapping is approxima tely constant
with time, so that a measure of the number of
trapped electrons can be used t o date the age 0 f
the speleothem . This can be done directly by the
use of ele ctron spin resonance (ESR) t echniques .
In practice there are many complications, both
with the ESR measurements and with determinations
of the radiation dose ra te from the environment.
However, the l a t es t results are encouraging and it
should not be long before the technique becomes
routine.

PALAEOMAGNETIC STUDIES OF CAVE SEDIMENTS

M. Noel ;
Sheffield

Department

of

Geology ,

University

of

Palaeomagnetic studies of lake sediment cores in

Britain
have
led
to
an
accurate
magnetostratigraphy for the last 10,000 years .
Cave
sediments
provide
an
oppo rtunity
for
extending thi s timescale into the mid or lower
Quaternary . Such a magnetostratigraphy will be an
important
tool
for
the
absolute
dating
and
correlation of cave deposits on a local and
regional scale .
Pilot studies of sediments from
Norway,
Wales,
Derbyshire
and
Sarawak
have
produced encourag i ng results .
The analysis of
sediment magnetic susceptibility anisotropy ha s
a l so enabled palaeo - flow directions to be deduced
in severa l cases.

CAVE PALYNOLOGY AND PALAEOECOLOGICAL

INVESTIGATIONS IN A CRESWELL CAVE
C. O. Hunt; Creswell Crags Visitor Centre , Worksop
G.
Coles;
Department
of
Prehistory
Archaeology , Sheffield University

R.P . Shaw,
Leicester

and

The palynological investigation of cave sediments

has been sadly neglected in Britain.
The reasons
for this neglect are critically discussed.
The
value of cave biostratigraphy is ill ustr a t ed using
examples from the caves at Creswell Crags.
19

THE FAUNAL CHRONOLOGY OF STUMP CROSS CAVE A FEASIBILITY STUDY FOR URANIUM SERIES
DISEQUILIBRIUM DATING OF BONE

CAVE DEVELOPMENT

Geography ,

FFYNNON DDU

P.L. Smart; Department of Geography, University of

Bristol

A.
Rae,
M.
Ivanovich ;
Uranium
Series
Disegui libr i urn Section , Nuclear Phys ics Divis ion ,
AERE Harwell, Oxon OX II ORA
M.M.
Sweeting ;
School
of
University, Oxford OXI 3TB

OGOF

N. Christopher; Chester Road, Poynton

The difficulties of geomorphological study in the
Ogof Ffynnon Ddu cave system are described, and
the generalised approach adopted is demonstrated
with respect to phreatic development .
There is a
strong reorientation of flow routes on change from
phreatic pressure flow to vadose gravitational
flow.
Vadose entrenchment and the development of
new phreatic passages are competitive responses to
falling base - levels.
However, through time there
is progressive eliminiation of phreatic passage
elements , which explains several at first puzzling
features of the Mainstream Passage .

Oxford

The uranium series diseguilbrium method has been

applied successfully t o date a cold climate fauna
found in Stump Cross Cave, North Yorkshire, using
speleothems in known stratigraphic relation to
bone fragments (S utcliffe et al . 1984) .
Material
from Stump Cross is also being used as part of a
study into the relationship between uranium and
fossil bone, towards the development of a direct
dating method for bone .
Is otopic contents and
activity ratios have been measured for bones and
sediments from different environments within the
cave ,
to obse rv e
the variations due
to the
permeabili ty of the bone matrix.
Granulometric
analysis and scanning electron microscopy studies
of sediments have been used to reconstruct the
hydrological and sedimentary importance of both
these
factors
to post - depositional uptake of
uranium by fossil bone .
Ages calculated from
isotope activity ratios within the bones indicate
an open system with regard to uranium dictated by
the nature of the bone matrix.
This is furtn"r
complicated by the inhomogeneous distribution of
uranium within the bones.
Results from Stump
Cross are compared with the data from ot her caves ,
in Wales and Mallorca, where similar analytical
studies are being made by the authors.

CAVE TEMPERATURE INVESTIGATIONS

RES ULTS FROM CRESWELL CRAGS
P.A . Smithson; Department of Geography , University
of Sheffield.
Previous investigations into cave temperatures
have stressed th e individuality of caves and the
difficulties of predicting interi or temperature
patterns.
Summer temperatures have been monitored
within two single ent ranc e caves at Creswell Crags
for a four - month period.
Thermistors were placed
at a variety of locations to sample temperature
change in relation to distance from the cave
entrance , and at d ifferent heights above the cave
f l oor.
Temperatures
were
recorded
every
15
minutes at each site.
In this way, the factors
influenc ing the patte rns of temperature within the
cave and how they vary in relation t o those
outside
the
cave
have
been
examined.
The
temperature difference between the cave inter ior
appears to be most significant in contro ll ing the
temperature pattern and air fl ow within the caves
studied .

URANIUM SERIES DATED MAMMAL IAN FAUNAS

FROM NORTHWEST YORKSHIRE CAVES
T . C. Lord; Pigyard Musuem , Settle , N. Yorks
Uranium series dating of calcite flowstones to
date Ple istocene mammal remains beyond the limit
of radiocarbon dating is described fr om Victoria
Cave
and
Stump
Cross
Cave.
The
results
demonstrate a marked change in the mammalian
faunas of northern England between about 120 , 000
years B. P . and about 83 , 000 years B. P .
The
presence of wolverine in the vicinity of Stump
Cross Cave at about 83,000 B.P.
indicates a
climatic
deterioration
from
the
interglacial
conditions of about 120,000 years B.P.
20

CAVE SCIENCE Vol . 12, No.1 , March 1985

Transactions o f the British Cave Research Association

Natural Evolution of Percolation Water in Altamira Cave

E. VILLAR , A. BONET, B. DIAZ - CANEJA, P.L. FERNANDEZ,
I . GUTIERREZ, L.S. QUINDOS, J.R. SOLANA AND J . SOTO
Abstract : This paper describes the results obtained in the analysis of the
volume and chemical composition of the waters flowing into the Hall of
Paintings in Altamira Cave (S andtander , Spain).
Measurements taken over a
period of nearly two years , reveal that the natural temporal variations in
the water volumes collected are relatively small.
Chemical analysis
allowed us to concluded that the waters are enc rusting and that the
concentration of many ions in solution does not vary significantly during
the whole year.
The exceptions are pH, bicarbonate i on concentration,
total dissolved solids concentration and calcite saturation index.
They
show well defined temporal variations that are fully explained by the
physicochemical equilibrium between the CO, - CaCO, - H,O
system and the
partial pressu re of CO, in the atmosphere of the Hall of Paintings .

INTRODUCTION
The Altamira Cave is located in the west
flank of the Santillana del Mar Syncline, near
Santander (Spain ), whose geologic map is shown in
figur e 1 .
The cave is placed in a stretch of
subhorizontal be ds of calcarenitic limestones from
0.5 to 1 m thick , of mid-Cretaceous age (Cendrero
et al. , 1976).
'fhey are separated by mudstones
and shales from 3 t o 10 cm thick, and sometimes by
thin marly-sandy intercalations of brown - green
colour.
The cave is situated in the upper portion o f
Altamira karst (in the so-called "senile area " o f
the karst) in which destructive processes are more
important than sedimentation and lithochemical
reconstruction.
Th e hydrologic dyamics of this
system are exc lusively due to direct infiltration
of rainwater through the different ca lc areous
layers (H oyos et al. , 1981) .
Although the cave possesses a remarkable
collection of prehistor i cal figures painted and
carved along the different chambers a nd galleries
of which it is composed, its main interest is
undoubtedly the ensemble of magnificent polychrome
figures on the roof of the world-famous Hall of
Paintings, which date back app roximately 16 , 000
years
(Jorda ,
1981) .
This
chamber
is
of
relatively small dimensions (150 m') in area and
2.5 m high), whose roof (with a mean thickness of
7 m)
is continuously, during the whole year,
impregnated by percolation waters.

;'

...

,"

. . . . :...

:.)5!l . . __ ..... :. . . . ~~ . . _ ....

. / ..... -: . . . ... ... .

. '.. .. .

.. ITIJ
O

100

FIgure 1.

2 - SANDSTONES and SHALES

WATER VOLUME COLLECTED IN THE

"HALL OF PAINTINGS"
The
drips
at
different
poin ts
of
the
polychrome roof, from the water which filters
through
the
roof
strata,
can
be
co nsider ed
r epresentative of the water volume which flows
into the Hall of Paintings.
For this study, nine
significant drip points in the roof have been
selected.
Water collected at th e different drip points
was measured once a week , by direct reading of
glass
tubes placed under the chosen points.
Figures 2 and 3 show monthly mean volumes, in
cc/day , collected at th e different points in the
roof of the Hall of Paintings , from May 1980 to
February 1982 .
Only two of the nine drip points selected
(Nos. 2 and 11) show appreciable varia tions of
volume over the period of measurement, with higher
values in the spring and lower in la t er summer and
early autumn .
The other seven points (Nos . 1, 3 ,
4, 5 , 12 , 13 and 14) shown an es senti al ly constant
monthly mean volume , with the maximum fluctuations
during the whole study period that do not exceed 3
or 4 cc/day.
Temporal variations of the drip rate at the
different sample points are relatively small, as
measured by the coefficients of variation .
A
maximum coefficient of variation of 7% of the
corresponding mean value was obtained for the
water volume collected at drip point 2.
Such a
coefficient means that in 68% of the cases the
water volumes measured at this point fall within
the range of values of 0 .9 3- 1 . 07 times the mean .
This indicates a low rate of infiltration and
vertical circulation of the waters through the
ground due to the absence of open vertical
fractures which are continuous through all the
calcareous strata located above the roof of the
Hall of Paintings (H oyos et al., 1981).
This
absence i n turn may be due to lack of soluti o n or
t o recrystallization of calcite in the interior of
the fractures, o r because they are infilled by
detrital clays.

200m

1 - MARLS

These
waters ,
depending
on
their
physicochemical
characteristics ,
are
mainly
responsible for the different damage and surface
alteration
processes
(such
as
rock
scaling ,
solution of pigments and precipitation of calcium
carbonate) ,
which
can
affec t
not
on ly
the
paintings but also the rock surface o n which they
were app lied in the Paleolithic period.
Thus, the
characterisation of the subterranean hydrologic
dyamics is important both with regard to the
i nflow ing
volumes
concerned
and
with
their
chemical composition, both of which may affect the
conservation of the Palaeolithic paintings.

3 - LIMESTONES

Geologic map of the Altamira area .

21

--

_ .... 'N' ... tl

" ..,3 'do f '

,-f--I-- t--

'"IV

v-

I- ;-"

V"-

rv- V"- f'.- -

1\

f\-- f-I

Ir- r...- ~'

IV

/I,.

, ,

, ,

, ,

1{1110

J....';

, ,

1111"

I"OfENT, ... l

(" ... "on"'N SI'lt ... TION

""

I"~

'b..

m~ rrn rm ~ ~

IV I~v

~~~ ~
-

.",3/ do,

VOlUMl,

, -tI

-- VOLUME, l -J -4 -5-" -lJ- U

1-,
I

I~

o~
..,

0 1/\

VOlUMl

1--,.....

198'

o
0

~ .

. -0.

.0-

. .
I

Figure 2 .
Annual vari at ion of the monthly mean volumes
collected from the selected drip points .

' 0>

t-<>-r-o--

..0..

.0-

V l -I. ~.

_..0-

. <0- .

V ~ i"""~f'o-j-<>.~

. ~

.~

'00

11180

.-0.

i-"['-.

. ~.

&

'~

~
D

V- V- i-~

.~

I--

.f

"a

18111

Figure 4. Annual variation of monthly rainfall and potential

evapotranspiration in the Altamira area and monthly mean
volumes collected in the Hall of Paintings.

VOLUMt
"",3/ . 0 ."

CHEMICAL COMPOSITION OF THE COLLECTED WATERS

--

'l.- 1-0- f-

"

l?- t-- i-"-- r- ~

..4'
.A

'.,
I

, ,

I
11180

Figure 3.

V'~

...0..

- --

.-'>-

h:::
,,- I- t't-- H>0

I--

r-- f-'

),'

-;'l

, ,

I
1881

Chemical
analyses
carried
out
on
the
different water samples collected from the nine
drip points in the Hall Paintings cover a period
of nearly two years , from January 1981 to August
1982.
The different chemical parameters analysed in
each of the water samples c o llected have been pH,
concentrations
of
bicarbonate ,
carbonate ,
sulphate, chloride, nitrate, calcium, magnesium,
the
concentration
of
total
dissolved
solids
(T . D.S . ) and,
finally,
the calcite saturation
index (SIc) '
This last has been calculated from
the expression (Berner and Morse, 1974; Picknett
et a l., 1976):
SIc= log (IAP/K s )
where lAP is
the ion activity product of calcite in solution
and Ks the solubility product for calcite.
In
essence, Ks only depends on the temperature , which
varies between 13.4C and 14.5C for the different
water samples collected in the Hall of Paintings
of Altamira Cave.
With the exception o f pH, all the chemical
analyses made during the study (except for calcium
and magnesium which were analysed from September
1981 onwards ) were carried out on the day of
sample
collection
in
the
l abo ratory
of
the
Al tamira Research Centre located near the cave.
The pH was always measured in the field, at the
time water samples were collected , by means of a
WTW pH- meter , model DIGI 88, with an experimental
error of 0.01 pH units.
Ta ble I shows the
different analytical techniques used and their
corresponding
detection
limits
and
average
accuracies (American Public Health Association,
1975 ; Rodier, 1978).

I- e-f.!

'"

Annual variation of the monthly mean volumes

collected from the selected drip pOints .

In
order
to
achieve
a
more
detailed
understanding of the possible relation between the
water volumes collected at the nine drip points of
the polychrome roof and the characteristics that
define the annua l cycle of the infiltration water
in the Altamira area, monthly mean values of the
two variables which
fundamentally define the
hydrologic
balance
(rainfa l l
and
potential
evapot ranspiration)
(Strahler,
1974)
have been
evaluated.
Approximate calculation of th e latter
has been c a rried out using Thornthwaite ' s method
(Walton, 1970).
Figure 4 shows the variations of these two
parameters
during
the
period
of
measurement
together with the variation in the monthly mean
water collected at the different selected drip
points.
It shows that , whereas the t ota l volume
coming from th e group of the points 1, 3, 4 , 5,
12,
13 and 14 can be considered practically
constant in time, the volume coming from points 2
and 11 shows more distinct variations of the
annual infiltration cycle in the Altamira area.
Thus, the decrease at these last two points
experienced during the summer month corresponds to
potential
evapotranspiration
values
exceeding
monthly rainfall in the Altamira area.
This
implies consumption of the moisture stored in the
ground and, theref ore , a progressive reduction in
the
amount
of
water
available
for
deeper
infiltration.
Likewise,
the increase in this
volume during the autumn and winter months can be
exp l ained if it is kept in mind that, during this
period, monthly rainfall in the Altamira area far
exceeds
the
values
of
potential
evapot ranspirati on.
Excess rainwater penetrates
into the ground and,
once the soil moisture
deficit has been replaced, a water surplus tends
to percolate downwards into the bedrock.

PARAMETER

ANALYTICAL METHOD

HCO~, COj- Volumetric method for the

DETECTION
AVERAGE
LIMIT(mg!l) ACCURACY(%)
1.0

alkalinity measurement
C1

NO;
Ca", Mg"

T.O.S.

Mohr's method

0.2

Turbidimetric method

0.5

Brucine method

o. 1

Complexometric method with

e thylen - diamine tetracetic
acid (EOTA)

0.5

Gravimetric method (after

evaporation at 110C)

1.0

TABLE 1

22

0,3
0.2
0 ,1

- - GROUP II
'0

0_ '0'

31;;

.,.- '-<>""-"""ro-f-<>-:--o- - ......- f,o...l"-r-v-""

36
33
30
27
40

bicarbonate
concentrati o n ,
which
is
l og ical
because the latter is th e dominant anion in the
different water samples ana lysed .
3)
The concentrations o f sulph ate , chloride ,
nitrate,
calcium
and
magnesium
ions
can
be
considered practically constant during the whole
period
of
measuremen t ,
since
they
show
coefficients of
variati o n which nev e r exceed 3%
of the co rr esponding mean concentration .
4 ) The calcium i on concentration measured in
the different water samples collected wa s a lw ays
lower than t he magnesium c o ncentrati o n.
This must
be a consequence o f the slow water infiltrati on
process through the ground , during which the ratio
of disso lved calcium and magnesium c o ncentr a ti ons
tends to decrease (Bogli , 1980 ; Dreybrodt, 1981).
Also , it can be seen that th e differences
between magnesium and calcium concentr a ti o ns are
greater for Group II waters that Group I waters.
This must be due to a lower rate of infiltration
of the Group II waters: these wat er s show a n
essentially constant monthly mean volume over the
period o f measur ement .
5 ) The calcite saturation index (SIc) of the
different water samples collected is positive in
every
case .
This
means
that
calcium
concentrat i ons
were
always
greater
than
the
corresponding
ones
in
the
equilibrium
and ,
theref o re , that the different water collected in
the Hall of Paintings were supersaturated with
respect to calcite .
On the other hand,
the
calci te saturatio n index shows , in both groups ,
th e same type of variation as the pH , opposite to
th e bicarbonate ion variation .
This is because a n
increase in pH of the solution and a decrease in
its
bicarbonate
concentration
causes
th e
solubility of calcite to decrease and , theref o re,
the calcite saturation
index
to
increase by
definition .

GROUP I

..0-

4.

-0-

-0'

... 0-

-0-

-0"

- 0 -

_ ..

_0 _

-0-

-0-

-0"

- 0'

-0-

pc;,.

-0-

-0-

-0-

'CP

-0'

::i

-0

30
20
10
16

12

'0

40

CONCLUSIONS

19 81

We have measured , over a period of nearly two

years , the volumes of waters which filter into the
Hall of Paintings in Altamira Cave , in a group of
nine
significant
drip
points
from
the
nine
selected
points
from
its
polychrome
roof.
Analyt ical results show a monthly mean wat er
volume in this chamber , coming fr o m the nine
selected points , of approximate ly seven litres ,
with natural tempora l
variations of collected
monthly mean volume which can a l ways be considered
relatively small.
Chemical analyses o f the different wate r
samples indicate their encrus ting character as
well as the absence of sign ific ant naturally
variations in the majority if the analysed ions
(sul phate ,
chloride ,
nitrate ,
calcium
and
magnesium).
The concentration o f total dissolved
solids always follows the same type of variation
as the concentration of bicarbonate ion, which is
the dominant anion in the diffe rent water samples
analysed .
Finall y pH, bicarbonate concentration
and calcite saturat i on index of the different
collected waters show significant natural tempor a l
variations which are
fully explained by
the
physicochemical equil ibri um between the CO 2 - CaCO,
- H2 0 system and the CO content in the atmosphere
of the Hall of Paintings.

19 ~

Figure 5 . Annual variation of the monthly mean values of

the different chemical parameters analysed in the waters
collected in the Hall of Paintings .

On the basis o f th eir chemical composition ,

waters coming from the different drip points
selected
on
the
polychrome
roof
have
been
classified in two general groups , so that the
chemical characteristics of the waters included in
each of them are similar: - Group I
waters
collected from points 2 , 5 and 1 1 ; and Group II waters from points 1, 3 , 4, 12 , 13 and 14 .
Figure 5 shows, for both of thes e groups, the
natural temporal variations in the monthly mean
values
of
the
different
chemical
parameters
analysed .
The
figure
does
not show results
obtained
for
the
carbonate
i on ,
as
its
concentration (i n the order of 4% of the total
anionic content a t most ) can be considered as
i nsignificant in every case .
From this figure,
several interesting conclusions can be deduced:
1 ) The bicarbonate i on concentration and the
pH
in
both
group s
of
wa t ers
are
c l early
antipathetic .
On the ot h er hand , bicarbonate ion
concentration shows the same kind of variation as
the parti~l pressure of carbon dioxide P (C0 2 ) ,
measured l.n the a1.r of the Hall of Paintings ,
which in turn is fundamentally conditioned by the
magnitude of th e air interchanges between th e cave
and the outside atmosphere (Villar et al ., 1983) .
This result is justified, obviously , taking into
account that an increase of the partial pressure
of
carbon
dioxide
in
the
atmosphere
means,
according to Henry's law , an increase of its
concentration in water , and this, on hydrating
int o carbonic acid and dissociating af t erwards ,
leads to an increase in bicarbonate concentration
and a decrease in pH.
2)
The concentration of total dissolved
solids (T. D. S.) follows the same variation as the

REFERENCES
American Public Health Associat i on , 1975.
Standard methods
f or the examination of water a nd waste wa t er , 14th edn .,
New York .
Berner, R. A. and Morse , J .W., 1974 . Dissolution kinetics o f
calcium carbonate in sea water . Part IV.
Theory of
calcite dissolution . Am . J. Sci . vol. 274, p . 108 - 134 .
Bogli , A., 198 0 . Karst hydrology and phys i cal speleology.
Springer - Verlag, Ne w York .
Cendrer o , A. , Valle , J.F . and Moya , J ., 1976 . Estudio de la
roca soporte de las pinturas rupestres de la Cu e v a de
Altamira.
Zephyrus, vol 28 , p. 5- 15.
Dreybrod t, W. / 1981 . Kinetics of the dissolution of calcite
and its application to Karstification. Chern . Geol .,
vol 31 , p. 245 - 269 .

23

Hoyos , M., Bustillo , A. , Gar cia , A., Martin , C. , Ort iz, R.,
Suaz o , C . and Esteban, A., 198 1 .
Caracte ris ticas
geologico - carsticas de la Cueva de Altamira .
I ns titut o
de Geo logia , Consejo Supe ri or de Investigaciones
Cientificas , Madri d .
Jorda , F. , 1981 .
El gra n techo de Altamira y s us santuarios
Superpuestos.
Aetas del Sympos iu m Internacional sabre

Art e Pr e historico (A lamira Sympos ium), p. 277 - 289 .

Minsterio de Cultur a , Madrid.

Picknett , R.G., Bray, L . G. and Stenner , R.D., 1976 .

chemistry o f cave wate rs.

The

In the Science of Speleology

(Ford, T.D. and Culli ngfo rd, C.H . D. ed .), p . 137 - 189 .
Academic Press , London.
Rodier , J., 1978.
L ' analyse de l'e a u : eau x natuerlles , eaux
residuaires , eaux de mer .
Dunod Te ch n ique, Paris .

Strahler , A.N ., 1974 .

Physic a l Geogr ap hy.

Wiley, New York .

Vill a r , E ., Fernandez , P.L., Quindos , L.S . , Solana , J . R . and

s o ta, J., 1983 .
Flu jos de materi a en la cueva de
Altamira .
Mon og r a fia No . 9.
Direccion General de
Bellas Artes y Archivos .
Mi nisterio de Cultura,

Madrid .
Walton , W. C ., 1970 .
Grounwater r esource evaluation .
McGraw - Hil l, New York .

Revision received December 1984

E . Villar, A. Bonet , B. Diaz - Caneja, P.L. Fernandez,
Gutie rrez, L.S . Quindos, J.R. Solan a and J . Soto.

I,

Fundamen t al Physics Department,

Sc i e nce Faculty,
Univ e rsity of Santande r ( Spain ) .

24

CAVE SCIENCE Vol. 12 , No.1 , March 1985

Tr ansac ti ons of the Brit i sh Cave Research Association

The World's Earliest Underground Cave Photograph

by Alfred Brothers F.R.A.S.

Chris HOWES
Abstract : The production of a cave ph o t og raph by Alfred Brothe rs F . R. A.S.
on Friday 27th January 1865 at th e Blue John Caverns, Der byshir e , Engl and ,
is reported.
Brothers (1 826 -1912) work ed in Manchester where the wo rld ' s
first commer cial production o f magnesium
started i n 1863, and h e us ed the
new magnesium ribbon t o prove that t he cave co uld be illumin a ted th e reb y .
His pho t o is tho ught to be the world's earliest cave photo pre - dating those
of Waldack in 1866 and Mari ot in 1877.

I NTRODUCT ION

Brothers was present a t this mee ting and

obtained
a
sample
of
magnesium
metal
for
experimen t a t ion from Dr . Roscoe of Owens College ,
Manchester , who had been i nvolved with the initial
experiments into magnesium purification and a
photometric comparison of burning magn es ium with
sunl ight with Professor Bunsen (of Bu n sen burner
fame ) a t Heidelberg in 1858 . (Anon l859a, Anon.
1859b (pp 920-923);
Frankland ( 1865,1877).

For many
years
cred it
has
gone
to
an
American ,
Charles
Waldack,
for
producing
the
earliest
underground
cave
photog r aphs
using
artific i al light in Mammoth cave, Kentucky , in
1866 (Quinlan, 1973;
Shaw , 1979 ) .
Mariot was
acknowledged as being the first European cave
photographer when he produced pictures of the
Adelsberg caves, now named Postojna caves, in
Yugoslavia in 1867 (Kranjc , 1983; 1984 ).
Earlier
attempts at Mammoth cave by unknown photog r aphers
had
all
proved
unsuccessful
(Qu inlan,
1973 ).
However a successful pho t ograph was made a year
before Waldack by Alfred Brothers in the Blue John
Caverns near Castleton, Derbyshire, England, in
January 1865 .
Alfred Brothers , 2nd January 1826 - 26th
August 1912, was born i n Sheerness in Kent, the
son of a chemist .
Leaving school at the age o f
th ir teen wi th a poor ed uca t ion he was t o become
interested in astronomy, drawing , electric i ty and
photography.
A practical man by natu r e, he was
largely self taught in these matters (H al l et t ,
1975).
He married in 1853 and was transferred to
the Manchester branch of the insurance company he
worked for in 1855.
His ded i cation t o photography
grew
and
when
the
Anchor
Insurance
Company
collapsed he purchased a photographic business the
following year ( Ano n , 1912 ) . Most of his work was
in portraiture or cartes- de- visite.
I n 1855 the Manchester Photographic Society
was formed , one of the first such soc i eties in t he
country , and Brothers joined soon after .
He r e he
met other rather bet t er educa t ed men such as James
Nasmyth, Dancer , Mudd and Sidebotham, all of whom
were i nvolved in fUrthering photog r aph ic p r ogress ;
J.B.Dance r, for example, invented a new stereo
camera .
Although Brothers d i d not feel entirely
comfortable in their compa n y (M i ll igan , 1982 ) , he
left the Photographic Society with them to set u p
a
'Photographic Section of
the
Litera r y and
Philosophical
Society of
Manchester'
in
1864
(Anon, 1863;
Anon 1864d ).
Although the section
was not formally convened unt i l November ( Anon ,
1864f) , meetings were held at regular intervals,
and it was at one of these tha t Brothers first saw
magnesium burned .
The first commercia l prod uc t ion of magnesium
in t he world was begun i n Ma nchester i n 1863 using
the patents of Edward So nstadt, a local man .
The
Magnesium
Metal
Company
produced
purif i ed
mag nesium in the form of a t h i n wire ( Anon , 186 4 c ;
Chapman, 193 4 ), and i t was l eft to P r o f essor
Roscoe to demonstrate the light for the first time
to a meeting of the Manchester Literary and
Philosophical Socie t y on 9th February 1864 (Anon,
1864a ) .

Alfr ed Brothers' F . R. A .S. fr om a carte - d e - visi te .

(photograph er un known)
25

Brothers
soon
ascertained
its
worth
by
photographing an engraving by its light (Anon,
1864c;
Brothers, 1864a).
Over the following
months he expe rimented with reflectors in making
portraits and photographing busts (Anon, 1864c;
Anon, 1864b;
Anon, 1864f;
Brothers, 1864b) and
found means of softening shadows by moving the
burn ing
mag nes i urn
dur ing
the exposure
(Anon,
1864c)
Magnesium in the form of a wire was found to
burn
unevenly
and
would
frequently
break.
Brothers formed his strands into a taper where two
or more were bound up with a third so that if one
went out the others would relight it (Anon,
1864f). He also found that magnesium in the form
of a ribbon burned better with its increased
surface area, and henceforth the Magnesium Metal
Company produced ribbon instead of wire (Anon,
1912;
Brothers, 1864 c;
Brothers, 1899, Brothers,
1908) .
Photography in the 1860s wa s not as common or
as easy as it is now.
Cameras were heavy and
cumbersome, the photographs being made on glass
pIa tes.
These had to be prepared, exposed and
developed within a very short space of time before
the collodion which coated them dried - hence the
name given to the photography of this era, wet
plate collodion.
Co llod ion
was
prepared
from
gun
cot ton
dissolved in ether, this being poured over the
cleaned glass plate.
It could then be sensitised
by dipping it into a solution containing silver
nitrate, in the dark, of course.
It was therefore
quite an undertaking for a photographer to leave
his studio carrying with him tripod, plates,
camera, and chemicals both for preparing the
emulsion and for developing it.
Nevertheless,
early in 1865 Brothers decided to attempt to take
a photograph underground.

Blue John is a form of fluorspar that could be

made
into
vases
and
ornaments
(Ford ,
1955;
911erenshaw et aI, 1963), and it is only found
locally in the limestone of the Treak Cliff hill
near Castleton (Royse, 1943;
Ford, 1980). Miners
discovered its presence as they searched for lead,
combing the hillside and investigating the natural
cave systems some 200 years ago.
By the 1840s the
veins of Blue John were said to be "nearly worked
out"
a statement repeated at intervals ever
since as "sales talk".
Infrequent tourists were
taken in from th e discovery around 1770 but access
was down a crude miners' stemple stairway, and the
present pathways and stone staircases considerably
improved things around 1840.
Up to the time of improved access around 1840
- 1843 the caverns were named 'Treke Cliff Back'
or
'Waterhole'
(Royse,
1943),
'Water
Hull'
(Hedinger, 1815), or 'Water Hull Pipe' (Royse,
1947), but this was changed to the 'Blue John
Mines' in the hope that it would appeal more to
tourists. With the same reasoning, it also became
known as the Blue John Caverns since the tourist
route follows natural cave passage exclusively.
Workings for Blue John stone lead off this at
various points, the old miners using the natural
cave a s an easy means of access.
In 1864,
however, Brothers knew the caverns as the Blue
John Mines and labelled his photograph as such
(Brothers, 1899), even though he is not known to
have entered any of the mine workings.
THE PHOTOGRAPH
The photog raph shows natural passage, with
calcite formations on the wall, and was published
by Brothers (1899) facing page 62 in the second
edition of his book on photography (the photo is
not in the first edition).
At present, despite
exhaustive searches, neither the negative or an
original print have been traced.
This naming of the location as a mine by
Brothers has led to his work being ignored by
speleological
historians,
interested
primarily
only in caves.
Accurate information about the

BLUE JOHN CAVERNS

The nature of the location Brothers chose,
the Blue John Caverns, is worth consideration.

BLUE JOHN CAVERNS

SOm

NA TURAL CAVERNS ~
all other paa ge. are man-made

TOURIST ROUTE -'-- -'-"'.

Sketch Enlargement of

Crys tallized Cavern

Brother.' photo

26

in 1926.
This left Brothers with two locations
for his attempt;
Peak Cavern and the Blue John
Caverns.
Of these Peak Cavern might appear the
more obvious choice, but in 1865 he had two
opt ions open to him for travel from Manches ter;
horse and carriage or train.
Of these the train
is the most likely both for speed , ease of
carrying the photographic equipment and comfort in
the winter weather.
Using the train would also
enable the trip t o be concluded within a single
day as the Manchester Photographic Society had
shown the previous August when they held an
outdoor meeting in Matlock Bath, further south
than Castleton (Anon, 1864e). The railway in 1865
had not yet been extended
through Edale towards
Castleton, so the nearest station would have been
Chapel-en-le - Frith (Hughes, 1868), a journey of
one hour from Manchester.
The final part of the
journey from Chapel- en-le-Frith could then be
completed with a hired horse and carriage, the
Blue John Caverns being th e first and closest
location reached.

attempt
has
not
been
readily
availahle.
Photographic history books make little reference
t o the picture, and when this lS done inaccuracies
have been compounded so that the Blue John mines
become coal mines (Gernshein & Gernshein, 1955).
Jackson (1968) noted the attempt in passing whilst
researching
Waldack,
but
found
information
'something very hard
to find'
and
failed
to
recognise
th e
significance
of
Brothers'
photograph, no doubt due to the mining references.
The dating of Brothers' attempt has not been
readily ascert ai nable, mainly due to Brothers
himself relying on a faulty memory when recording
details and dates.
In his autobiography (1908) he
chose 1860, a time before magn esi um was available.
In a letter to a newspaper (1876), the first known
time that Brothers referred to his picture in
writing, he claimed 1863.
'Early in 1864' was
given in his book on ph o tography (18 99).
These
var 10US dates have then been quoted in other
photographic works, which in turn obtained their
data from each other in some cases, adding to the
confusion
(e.g.
Eder,
1945;
Gernshein
&
Gernshe in,
1955) .
However,
two contemporary
reports exist which date the attempt exactly .

Once underground, Brothers chose the first

place that was large enough for his photographic
attempt, staying on the tourist route through the
cave and ignoring the mine workings which would
have necessi ta ted crawl ing .
Th i s was a location
he la ter named as the Cupola Cavern (18 76 ) , more
commonly known as the Crysta l 1 ised Cavern.
(See
survey, after a plan by Deakin & Whitehouse
(Whitehouse 1970.
The name given to it by
Brothers has rarely appeared on surveys or in
descriptions of the caverns, and it may have been
used as a descriptive name.
(A cupola was a type
of
furnace
for
smel ting
lead
ore
(Ford
&
Rieuwerts, 1983), the term also be ing used to
describe a dome. The Crystallised Cavern has this
distinctive shape).

The photograph that Brothers produced was

shown to an ordinary meeting of the Manchester
Literary and Philosophical Society Photographic
Section on the 2nd February 1865 (Anon, 1865a),
and was recorded in the minutes. A fuller account
appeared in a report in the British Journal of
Photography, published on February 10th (Anon,
1865b) .
"Mr. A. Brothers stated that on the 27th
ultimo, accompanied by two friends, he started for
the Blue John Mine in Derbyshire, for the purpose
of endeavouring to photograph it by the aid of the
magnesium light."
This report on the meeting
shows that the photograph was exhibited less than
a week after the attempt on the 27th January 1865.
Being made almost immediately and coming from an
unbiased source the report counters Brothers'
claims for earlier dates and it may be concluded
that the 27th January 1865 is an accurate date.

Several
19 th
cen tury
eng rav ing s
0 f
approximately
the
same scene were listed by
T.R.Shaw (1967, p.8).
The earliest was in 1843
soon after the re-habilitation of the tourist
access, and shows a well - lit "cupola" though no
actual
chandelier
is
visible
(reproduced
in
J.Royse,1943).
The name Crystallized Cavern was
in use by 1854, but it was still known as Cupola
Cavern in 1860 (Milner, 1860, p.244), when a
chandelier was clearly shown.
W.Royse's guide
book of 1891 does not show the chandelier but
mentions it in the text.
The stereo photograph shows flows tone on the
wal l, some rubble on the floor which has now bee n
stacked in a side passage, and the old chandelier.
This was used to hoist candles aloft for lighting
the dome for tourists.
The previously last
recorded use of the chandelier was in 1843 (Adam,
1857;
Ollerenshaw , 1964).
Brothers' photograph
indicates that it was still present in 1865.
W.Royse's guide book mentions it in 1891 but
apparently it was discarded and thrown into a side
passage
after
then,
and
only
uncovered
and
re-installed in 1959 (Ollere nshaw, 1964).

Later,
Brothers
was
to
name
his
two
companions that aided him with the photograph, but
again there is difficulty due to his inexact
memory.
In a l etter (1876) he referred to them as
"Mr. W.Mather and the late Mr. J. Pownall", whilst
the names are given as Mr. William Mather and Mr.
Mellor in his book on photography (Brothers,
1899).
William Mather, the name common in both
references,
was
an engineer employed
by
the
Magnesium Metal Company and who had designed the
maChinery needed to produce the magnesium wire and
then modified this to make a ribbon following
Brothers' report.
He also devised the first
mag nes i urn lamp, a holder wh ich could be used to
burn the metal.
Mr. Mellor was also associated
with the same company as manager.
Whilst it is
not certain that both men were present it can be
concl uded that the business was both repr esented
and interested in the venture and possibly donated
th e magnesium which was still ruinously expensive.

LIGHTING THE PHOTOGRAPH

To produce the picture Brothers would have
had to coat his plate and load it into the stereo
camera in the dark, and then make his exposure
using
the magnesium.
It was reported
that
Brothers used magnesium wire (Anon, 1865b), but
this was more likely to have been ribbon.
This
was favoured by Brothers and was by now in full
production at the Magnesium Metal Company factory.

THE PHOTOGRAPHIC EXPEDITION

The choice of the venue would
initially
appear to be a strange one to the modern v isi tor
in the area.
Around Castleton there are four
places where the tourist can obtain easy access
underground .
Peak Cavern is easily reached within
the village, and using Castleton as a
base both
Speedwell and Treak Cliff Caverns have to be
passed to reach th e Blue John Caverns near the t op
of the hill.
In 1865, though, Brothers had more
limitations imposed on him than a modern tourist
does.
Speedwell, then as now, would have raised
difficulties with its flooded canal, whilst Treak
Cliff Cavern was unknown save for some mine
workings in what is now the outer part of the
cave.
The show cave did not ope n until 1935
following the discovery of th e stalactite grottoes

"The mine being hrilliantly illuminat ed a

first rate negative was anticipated.
Th e exposure
was continued for five minutes, and the negative
was then developed;
un fortuna tely, however, it
was found to be fogged, owing, as it was found on
careful
examination,
to
the
difference
in
temperature of the mine (whi ch lay 300 to 400 feet
below the surface) t o that of the atmosphere,
having caused a damp film to se ttle on th e lens.
It was unfortunate that this had been overlooken,
27

Alfred Brothers' stereo photograph

of the Crystallized Cavern , Blue John Caverns,
taken on 27 January, 1865.

as a prin t which he (Mr. Brothers) exhibited

proved that the attempt was perfectly successful".
(Anon, 1865b).
Brothers had evidently not allowed his lenses
to settle at th e same temperature as the cave,
which was warmer than that of the cold winter
weather outside.
However, this theory cannot
account for the mistiness obscuring the left side
of each picture.
The camera, being stereo, has
two lenses each casting a separate image on the
collodion plate;
condensation would not have
affected each lens in such a similar fashion.
What is more likely is that this is condensation
in the air forming from the breath of Brothers or
his companions over the long exposure time, or
from the encroaching fumes of the slowly burning
magnesiuim.
In any case, due to the dense smoke
formed "by th e burning of wire necessary for an
exposure of so lengthened a
period " (Anon,
1865b), it was impossible to expose a second plate
and the party returned to the surface.
Brothers never repeated his experiment in
underground photog raphy.
Th i s had been made to
test the effectiveness of the n e wly developed
magnesium in lighting a scene never illuminated by
dayl ight, in the company of representative of the
firm that produced the metal.
Brothers himself
was content with having proved that the production
of such a picture was possible.
Contemporary
reports accept the attempt as being the first such
made underground with magnesium, and magnesium
production was both expens ive and at comparatively
low levels.
Its use .outside Manchester was still
slight, and it is extremely unlikely that there
had
been
any
prior
successful
photographic
attempts
made.
Alred
Brothers'
picture,
therefore, is the earl iest known underground cave
photograph in the world and it is not thought to
have been preceeded by any other.
It is of
course,
also
the
world's
first
stereo
cave
photograph;
regrettably the make of camera used
is not known.
The Crystallized Cavern , Blue John Caverns ,
in October 19 84 with the original chandelier
present .
(photo Chris Howes)

28

Jackson, G. f. 1968.
(In tr oductory] Note ;
p200 in Waldack ,
C.1 968 .
Photog~aphy in the Mammoth Cave by Mgnesium Wi~e
- 1866; National Speleol. Soc . News . vol. 26 no.12 pp
200-202.
Kranjc, A. A. 1983.
0 Prvih fotografijah iz Posto jnske Jame;
Nase Jame, vol 25, pp 23-28.
Kranjc, A.A. 1994.
Per sonal Communication .
Milligan, H. 1982.
Keeper of P hotog~aphy, North Weste~n
Museum of Science & Industry,
Manchester.
Personal
Communicat i on .
Milner, T. 1980.
The gall e ~y of nature.
Ollerenshaw , A.E. & Harrison , R.J . & Harrison, D. 1963. The
History Of Blue John Stone . pub. Ollerenshaw, Castleton .
Quinlan, J.F. 1973.
Photographic Entrepreneurs at Mammoth
Cave , 1 866 ;
preliminary report.
Journal Spelean Hist .
vo l 6 no. 2; pp 38-39.
Royse, J. 1943. Ancient Castleton Caves.
Chas . Swinburn &
Co . Ltd , Sheffield.
76pp
Royse , J. 1947.
Blue John. Cave Science (old B. S.A . Series)
vol .l, no . 2 , pp 39-45.
Royse , W. 1891.
Descriptive account of the Blue John mines.
(Guide book ).
Sha w,
T.R.
1967.
Cave
ilustrations
before
1900.
Brit.Speleo . Assoc.Monograph.
Shaw, T.R. 1979. History of Cave Science.
Ph . D. t hesis .
Unive rsity of Le i cester .
Whitehouse , R.H. 1970.
Blue John Caverns. Eldon Pothole Club
Jour . vol.7, no .3. pp . 33 -4 2 .

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to thank the following fo~ thei~ help with
this investigation ;
Mr. Chamberlain - Brothers for making his
ancestorls autobiography typescript available to me , Ms
M. DeMott

of

Manchester

Central

Library

and

Ms

R.

Con way

of

the
BCRA
Library,
Matlock
for
assistance
in
locating
information, Dr.T.O.Ford for information on the tour ist caves
of Castleton, Paul Deakin for agreeing to th e use of his
su~vey
of
Blue
John
Caverns
( Whiteho use 1970)
and
to
Dr.H . Rice of Galway Univ e~s ity for re-drawing it, and to
Dr.T.R.Shaw both for checking and commenti ng on t he d raft of
this paper and his constant encour a gement and guidance.

REfERENCES
Anon, 1854.
The Peak of Derbyshire;
The Blue John Mine. The
I llustrated London News.
August 26 p193 .
Adam, W. 1857. The Gem Of The Peak , 6th Ed. John & Charles
Mozley , Derby. p . 326.
Anon ,
1859a.
Transactions,
Manchester
Lit erary
and
Philosophical Society. p326.
Anon,
1859a.
Transacti ons,
Manchester
Literary
and
Phi l osophical Society. p922 .
Anon,
1859b .
Professor
Bunsen
and
Dr.H . E . Roscoe ' s
Photo- Chemical Researches. IV .
The Photo- Chemical Action
Of The Sun Compared With That Of A Terrest~ial Source Of
L ight. Phil. Trans . Roy. Soc. vol 149, part 2 pp 879-926 .
Anon, 1863.
Minut es for December , Manchester Photog~aphic
Society.
Anon, 1864a.
Report of or;dina ry meeting, February 9th.
Manch ester
Literary
and
Philosophical
Society
Proceedings.
p233-235.
An on , 1864b.
Report of ordinary meeting , February 9th.
Manchester Literary and Philosophical Soc i ety , in the
Manchester Courier. Monday February 22nd. p3 , column 3 .
Anon, 1864c.
On The Use Of The Light Of Magnesium Wire In
Combustion , As A Photographic Agent .
Communication to
the Photographic Society of Scotland ord in ary meeting , in
The Photographic Journal ,
London. Ma r ch 15th. pp 5-6 .
An on , 1864d.
Minut es for April, Manchest e r Phot og raphic
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Received December 1984

Chris Howes FRPS,
51 Timbers Square,
Roath,
Cardiff CF2 3SH

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