mentioned. Menard (1964) described the marine geology
of the Pacific Ocean. Other representative works of Shepard cover the Northwest of Mexico (Shepard et al., 1960)
and submarine canyons (Shepard and Dill, 1966).
J. Bourcart carried out similar geomorphologic and sedimentologic studies off the shores of France, especially in
the Mediterranean. His concept of continental margin
“flexure,” with uplift landward of a hinge line and
downwarp seaward of it, proved useful in explaining the
migrations of sea-level across the shelf and in studying
the nature of sediment accumulation on the continental
slope.
The marine geomorphologist par excellence was
B. C. Heezen, whose physiographic diagrams of the seafloor (drawn with his collaborator, Marie Tharp) show
great insight into the tectonic and sedimentologic processes of the seafloor (Heezen et al., 1959). His graphs
now appear in virtually all textbooks of geology and geography. Of B. C. Heezen it has been said (somewhat facetiously, by E. C. Bullard) that he perfected the art of
drawing maps of regions where no data are available.
Much of his work is summarized in the beautifully illustrated book by Heezen and Hollister (1971). A brilliant
summary of our knowledge about the geological properties of sea and ocean floors, seafloor spreading, and plate
tectonics has been presented by Kennett (1982), later
updated by Seibold and Berger (1993).
Modern marine geosciences in Russia, China, and other
countries with similar “science histories” came about
much later. Russia woke up after World War II when the
cold war generated a fierce competition with western
nations. Russian marine institutions acquired ocean-going
research vessels and they were suddenly present on all
major ocean basins; scientists from the Shirshov Institute
of Oceanology and of the Vernadsky Institute of Geochemistry, both belonging to the Russian Academy of Sciences, made important contributions to global ocean
atlases of all major ocean basins, and they appeared as
authors of important textbooks. These important contributions to marine geosciences were only becoming familiar
to western scientists after they had been translated into
English (f. e. Lisitzin, 1972, 1996, 2002 or Emelyanov,
2005, see also Lobkovsky et al., 2013, 2014).
The fallacy of the quiet deep ocean
The earliest observers of deep-sea sediments were left
with the idea that the deep ocean contained a tranquil
depositional environment where fine-grained sediment
comprised mainly clay and shell/skeleton remains of the
plankton organisms living in the ocean water column. This
soon proved to be wrong when Wüst (1936) based on the
oceanographic data of the Meteor expedition discovered
patterns of deep ocean water movements which
transported cold and dense Antarctic bottom waters along
their deepwater pathways to the North, in fact across the
equator to the Northern Hemisphere. Today we also know
that a similar process transports cold and dense Arctic
water from the Norwegian-Greenland Sea across the
Greenland-Scotland Ridge into the deep basins of the
North Ocean to form the North Atlantic Deep Water (for
a general discussion, cf. Dietrich et al., 1975). Based on
these earlier observations and on dating the times when
ocean bottom waters were able to absorb the last time carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, Broecker (1991) developed the concept of the global ocean conveyor belt and its
influence on climate change.
Strong circumstantial evidence that Kuenen’s concept
is important in deep-sea sedimentation was first presented
by Heezen and Ewing (1952). In 1929 an important earthquake occurred off the Grand Banks, and at that time mysteriously a series of submarine telegraph cables failed,
many in sequence downslope with increasing distance
from the epicenter. There was much speculation about
the causes, until Heezen and Ewing (1952) determined
that turbidity currents, maybe also slumps triggered by
the earthquake, had resulted in the cable breaks.
To assume that the deep ocean has a tranquil depositional environment has proven to be completely
wrong, and many entries of this volume address phenomena and products of the highly dynamic sedimentary processes which influence (f. e. submarine slides) and in
part shape (f. e. abyssal plains) large tracts of the deepsea floors.
Stratigraphy, biostratigraphy, biochronology, and
the dawn of paleoceanography
The first indications of stratigraphic changes in South
Atlantic sediment cores were presented by Philippi et al.,
(1910) who had described the composition of sediment
cores taken by the first German Antarctic Expedition.
The next major step was achieved by Correns and Schott
(1936) who deduced from changes in the composition of
planktonic foraminiferal fauna in sediment cores taken
by the German Meteor expeditions that one could develop
a biostratigraphic correlations of the cores, that these
changes were related to the transition of deposits from
the last Ice Age to the Holocene, and that one could use
these data to calculate oceanic sedimentation rates.
A major leap was achieved by the Swedish Deep-Sea
Expedition on Albatross because the scientists from Gothenburg had developed the first piston corer, which
provided for the possibility for collecting relatively
undisturbed several meter long sediment cores. The
Albatross traversed along a transglobal course the
tropical-subtropical zones of all major ocean basins
(see for a summary: Olausson, 1996). In all basins they
detected patterns of a cyclical repetition of more or less
calcareous, mainly biogenic deposits which were soon
linked to glacial-interglacial changes. The Swedish Albatross cores can be considered to represent the dawn of
paleoceanography and marine paleoclimatology which in
later decades developed into a very important branch of
440
MARINE GEOSCIENCES: A SHORT, ECCLECTIC AND WEIGHTED HISTORIC ACCOUNT
of the Pacific Ocean. Other representative works of Shepard cover the Northwest of Mexico (Shepard et al., 1960)
and submarine canyons (Shepard and Dill, 1966).
J. Bourcart carried out similar geomorphologic and sedimentologic studies off the shores of France, especially in
the Mediterranean. His concept of continental margin
“flexure,” with uplift landward of a hinge line and
downwarp seaward of it, proved useful in explaining the
migrations of sea-level across the shelf and in studying
the nature of sediment accumulation on the continental
slope.
The marine geomorphologist par excellence was
B. C. Heezen, whose physiographic diagrams of the seafloor (drawn with his collaborator, Marie Tharp) show
great insight into the tectonic and sedimentologic processes of the seafloor (Heezen et al., 1959). His graphs
now appear in virtually all textbooks of geology and geography. Of B. C. Heezen it has been said (somewhat facetiously, by E. C. Bullard) that he perfected the art of
drawing maps of regions where no data are available.
Much of his work is summarized in the beautifully illustrated book by Heezen and Hollister (1971). A brilliant
summary of our knowledge about the geological properties of sea and ocean floors, seafloor spreading, and plate
tectonics has been presented by Kennett (1982), later
updated by Seibold and Berger (1993).
Modern marine geosciences in Russia, China, and other
countries with similar “science histories” came about
much later. Russia woke up after World War II when the
cold war generated a fierce competition with western
nations. Russian marine institutions acquired ocean-going
research vessels and they were suddenly present on all
major ocean basins; scientists from the Shirshov Institute
of Oceanology and of the Vernadsky Institute of Geochemistry, both belonging to the Russian Academy of Sciences, made important contributions to global ocean
atlases of all major ocean basins, and they appeared as
authors of important textbooks. These important contributions to marine geosciences were only becoming familiar
to western scientists after they had been translated into
English (f. e. Lisitzin, 1972, 1996, 2002 or Emelyanov,
2005, see also Lobkovsky et al., 2013, 2014).
The fallacy of the quiet deep ocean
The earliest observers of deep-sea sediments were left
with the idea that the deep ocean contained a tranquil
depositional environment where fine-grained sediment
comprised mainly clay and shell/skeleton remains of the
plankton organisms living in the ocean water column. This
soon proved to be wrong when Wüst (1936) based on the
oceanographic data of the Meteor expedition discovered
patterns of deep ocean water movements which
transported cold and dense Antarctic bottom waters along
their deepwater pathways to the North, in fact across the
equator to the Northern Hemisphere. Today we also know
that a similar process transports cold and dense Arctic
water from the Norwegian-Greenland Sea across the
Greenland-Scotland Ridge into the deep basins of the
North Ocean to form the North Atlantic Deep Water (for
a general discussion, cf. Dietrich et al., 1975). Based on
these earlier observations and on dating the times when
ocean bottom waters were able to absorb the last time carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, Broecker (1991) developed the concept of the global ocean conveyor belt and its
influence on climate change.
Strong circumstantial evidence that Kuenen’s concept
is important in deep-sea sedimentation was first presented
by Heezen and Ewing (1952). In 1929 an important earthquake occurred off the Grand Banks, and at that time mysteriously a series of submarine telegraph cables failed,
many in sequence downslope with increasing distance
from the epicenter. There was much speculation about
the causes, until Heezen and Ewing (1952) determined
that turbidity currents, maybe also slumps triggered by
the earthquake, had resulted in the cable breaks.
To assume that the deep ocean has a tranquil depositional environment has proven to be completely
wrong, and many entries of this volume address phenomena and products of the highly dynamic sedimentary processes which influence (f. e. submarine slides) and in
part shape (f. e. abyssal plains) large tracts of the deepsea floors.
Stratigraphy, biostratigraphy, biochronology, and
the dawn of paleoceanography
The first indications of stratigraphic changes in South
Atlantic sediment cores were presented by Philippi et al.,
(1910) who had described the composition of sediment
cores taken by the first German Antarctic Expedition.
The next major step was achieved by Correns and Schott
(1936) who deduced from changes in the composition of
planktonic foraminiferal fauna in sediment cores taken
by the German Meteor expeditions that one could develop
a biostratigraphic correlations of the cores, that these
changes were related to the transition of deposits from
the last Ice Age to the Holocene, and that one could use
these data to calculate oceanic sedimentation rates.
A major leap was achieved by the Swedish Deep-Sea
Expedition on Albatross because the scientists from Gothenburg had developed the first piston corer, which
provided for the possibility for collecting relatively
undisturbed several meter long sediment cores. The
Albatross traversed along a transglobal course the
tropical-subtropical zones of all major ocean basins
(see for a summary: Olausson, 1996). In all basins they
detected patterns of a cyclical repetition of more or less
calcareous, mainly biogenic deposits which were soon
linked to glacial-interglacial changes. The Swedish Albatross cores can be considered to represent the dawn of
paleoceanography and marine paleoclimatology which in
later decades developed into a very important branch of
440
MARINE GEOSCIENCES: A SHORT, ECCLECTIC AND WEIGHTED HISTORIC ACCOUNT