Scottish Lowlands

Abstract

The geology of Scotland includes some of the oldest rocks to be found anywhere and certainly the oldest in Britain, with rocks from the lower Proterozoic and Archaean to be found in the extreme north. The strata generally traverses Scotland in a south-west to north-east diagonal and, in the lowlands this takes the form of a band of Devonian rock, 354–417 million years of age, stretching across from just north of Glasgow in the west to Dundee and north of Dundee in the east. Above this band, the bulk of the lowlands are characterised by underlying rocks of the lower Palaeozoic and upper Proterozoic between 500 and 1000 million years of age. These are interspersed with intrusive igneous rocks across the area and, in the west there are rocks of volcanic origin which also occur in a thin band beneath the Devonian swathe, reaching across from Glasgow to Dundee.