The discovery of the Siberian Traps Large Igneous Province in 1870s,and the leading role of Aleksander Czekanowski |
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| Authors: | Grzegorz Racki |
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| Abstract: | Flood basalts (traps) and large igneous provinces (LIPs) are essential topics in modern geology. However, little is known about the stages of recognition of particular LIPs, including a giant continental LIP in Siberia. Even though basalt occurrences were reported from the region from the end of the 18th century (e.g., by Kozitsky, Middendorf, Schmidt and Lopatin), the first ample data were provided by the Polish geologist Aleksander Czekanowski (1833–1876). He was educated at the Universities of Kiev and Dorpat but exiled to Siberia for participating in the Polish January Uprising in 1863. Czekanowski organised three expeditions to poorly known parts of Central Siberia, which were initiated by exploring the Lower Tunguska River Basin. In the summer of 1873, he discovered many exposures of basalts and related tuffs. After an expedition to the Olenek River region in 1874, he was aware of a vast extent of basalt sequences and the critical impact of the “powerful volcanic floods” that immensely transformed the uplifted continent. Czekanowski emphasised “the discovery of previously unknown areas of igneous rocks of so large an extent that it exceeds the size of any other of its kind.” Studies of the volcanic series developed towards the end of the century, as summarised in an influential treatise from 1901 by the great Austrian geologist Eduard Suess. Czekanowski, distinguished in Seuss's monograph, is occasionally appreciated as the discoverer of the Siberian Traps but should also be adequately honoured in the neocatastrophism-based geology of the 21st century. |
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