ABSTRACT
As the nineteenth century drew to a close it fell to the Austrian scholar Eduard Suess to take stock of the momentous accumulation of geological information and speculation which the previous decades had yielded. The result of more than 20 years of study specifically directed to this end was the three-volume Das Antlitz der Erde (1883-1908). Although this huge composition is remembered now as a synthesis of nineteenth-century geology and as the greatest geological work since Lyell’s Principles, one of its most important and lasting effects was the statement of what has come to be known as the eustatic theory. Forming a groundswell to the whole discussion and being the explicit subject of volume 2 (1888) was the assumption that, apart from the orogenic belts, evidences of continental transgressions and regressions point to a remarkable synchronicity of swings of sea level in widely spaced areas of the globe. The apparently extensive and uniform character of these events prompted Suess to suggest (1906:537-8) that, apart from certain local movements, the continental areas of the world had been absolutely stable throughout geological time, and that the main onlaps and offlaps of the ocean had resulted from worldwide shifts of sea level due mainly to changes in the capacity of the ocean basins. On examination, these geological evidences of sea-level changes seemed to indicate that the positive eustatic movements of the marine transgressions were generally of long duration and that they were interrupted from time to time by much shorter offlaps associated with negative movements. The mechanism which Suess proposed to explain these rhythmical movements, apart from references to changes in the bodily disposition of ocean waters, perhaps due to the gravitational attraction of alternating polar ice-caps (Adhémar 1842, Suess 1904-24; see 1906:19, 553), involved the slow filling of the ocean basins by sedimentation, punctuated by increases in the capacity of the ocean basins by rapid subsidences of the ocean bottom (Suess 1904-24; see 1906:538-44). This basic theme of geological history suffered only slight elaborations due to vertical absolute movements of the crust which took place mostly in localized belts due to lateral compression (i.e. upfolding and downfaulting, etc.). Suess’ impressive scholarship, the massive mould into which he cast his beliefs, the timing of his work, its
symmetry, and not least the imaginative, at times almost mystical (Suess 190424; see 1906:1, 556), manner of its presentation which seemed so in keeping with the nineteenth-century tradition of German romanticism, all conspired to give added importance to Das Antlitz der Erde (Chorley 1963).
