The BGS Lexicon of Named Rock Units — Result Details

Holkham Till Member

Computer Code: HOTI Preferred Map Code: notEntered
Status Code: Full
Age range: Devensian Stage (QD) — Devensian Stage (QD)
Lithological Description: The Holkham Till Member is a dull reddish brown sandy clayey diamicton, which contains chalk and flint clasts together with Carboniferous and Triassic material and a variety of igneous and metamorphic rocks.
Definition of Lower Boundary: The Holkham Till Member is unconformably on older deposits. Locally it overlies gravel of an Ipswichian raised beach in the Hunstanton and Morston areas. Elsewhere it overlies a variety of Lower to Upper Cretaceous formations. There is an abrupt and very obvious lithological change across the boundary from the underlying arenaceous material or chalk, to the clay-silt dominated lithology of the till.
Definition of Upper Boundary: The Holkham Till Member is at surface or is locally overlain unconformably by sand and gravel of the Ringstead Sand and Gravel Member, by Head, and silt and clay of the British Coastal Deposits Group. The junction with the overlying deposits is unconformable and because of the change in lithology is easily discernable.
Thickness: Up to 10 m.
Geographical Limits: Along much of the northern coastal area of Norfolk from west of Hunstanton to Morston.
Parent Unit: Holderness Formation (HOLD)
Previous Name(s): Hunstanton Till [Obsolete Name and Code: Use HOTI] (-323)
Alternative Name(s): Holkham Till
Stratotypes:
Reference Section  Cliff sections at Hunstanton. Gallois, 1994. 
Type Section  Holkham Park Brick Pit, Holkham Estate. Moorlock et al., 2005. 
Reference(s):
Moorlock et al., 2005 in preparation. 
Gallois, R W. 1978. The Pleistocene history of West Norfolk. Bulletin of the Geological Society of Norfolk, Vol.30, 3-38. 
Gallois, R W, 1994. The geology of the country around King's Lynn and The Wash. Memoir of the British Geological Survey, Sheet 145 and part of 129 (England and Wales). 
McMillan, A A, Hamblin, R J O, and Merritt, J W. 2011. A lithostratigraphical framework for onshore Quaternary and Neogene (Tertiary) superficial deposits of Great Britain and the Isle of Man. British Geological Survey Research Report, RR/10/03. 343pp. 
Bowen, D Q. 1999. A revised correlation of Quaternary deposits in the British Isles. Geological Society Special Report, No. 23. 
1:50K maps on which the lithostratigraphical unit is found, and map code used:
E131 E129 E130 E145