Royat : medical guide / [George Henry Brandt].

  • Brandt, G. H. (George Henry)
Date:
1896]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Royat : medical guide / [George Henry Brandt]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    59/90 (page 55)
    locality of interest, over the extended area, occupied by these once active volcanoes and puys must commend itself to all whether sought for an account of their remarkable scenery, or for scientific research, and of all the deparments of France, the Puy de Dome offers every facility for investigating extinct volcanic phenomena. There also history claims a high place for the Roman colonization and occupation in this remarkable province, attested by the remains of their mineral baths, and intimate knowledge of the virtues of the same springs, which then rose, and still rise, through the interstices of these volcanic rocks, and their associated minerals, which led the way to the establishment of numerous and special mineral baths, not only over this area, but half Europe. The proximity of the double coned summit of Gravenoire, to Royat and Clermont-Ferrand has doubtless rendered it attractive to visitors, especially to those interested in and visiting the Auvergne for the purpose of investigating the extinct volcanic phenomena of this remarkable department of central France, and which for the combined researches of the geologist and mine- ralogist is probably unequalled, and rendered famous and accessible through the researches, and almost complete history of the Geological features and volcanic phenomena of the extinct volcanoes of central France^ by the late Mr. G. Poulett Scrope. The eruption to which the magnificent Puy de Gravenoire probably owes its origin has burs through a bed of earlier basalt, derived from the Puy de Charade, one of the highest points of the Gravenoire plateau, and which largely covers the eastern granitic slope, two miles South and South East Royat. The scoriee of Charade is still observable on its summit, but now only mark- ing it as the site of a former and older eruption, the crater having been probably obliterated, by the newer eruption of Gravenoire; the basalt of Charade has a dull and leaden aspect, much decomposde, and assuming spheroidal exfoliation in concentric laminee. The lava being rich in crystals of augite and nodular olivine.