The BGS Lexicon of Named Rock Units — Result Details

Tottenhill Sand and Gravel Member

Computer Code: TOTL Preferred Map Code: notEntered
Status Code: Full
Age range: Mid Pleistocene (QPM) — Mid Pleistocene (QPM)
Lithological Description: The Tottenhill Sand and Gravel Member is a complex sequence of sands and gravels, dominated by flint. They were formerly well exposed in the Tottenhill Gravel Pit, where two units were evident. A lower unit up to 5 m thick consists of medium to coarse, poorly sorted, mostly angular gravels with cross-bedding dipping steeply (20 to 25 degrees) to the southeast, and with frost wedge and cryoturbation structures. The gravels contain numerous pebbles of woody and reedy peat, soft brown clay, varved clay and Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous erratics. The upper unit is about 3.5 m thick and consists of fine- and medium-grained gravels, which are better sorted than the lower gravels, and have a planar cross-bedding dipping westwards at 8 to 15 degrees. The junction of the two units is marked by a well-defined, slightly uneven surface along which the upper gravels truncate cryturbation and bedding structures in the lower gravel. The lower unit has no known outcrop.
Definition of Lower Boundary: The Tottenhill Sand and Gravel Member unconformably overlies silts and clays of the Nar Valley Clay and the Nar Valley Freshwater Beds with a sharp lithological change. Elsewhere it locally overlies chalky till of uncertain affinity (but probably Lowestoft Formation or Sheringham Cliffs Formation).
Definition of Upper Boundary: The Tottenhill Sand and Gravel Member is locally overlain by a cryturbated mixture of dull red-brown, sparsely stony, sandy clay and gravelly sand. This might be a till, although Lewis and Rose (1991) have interpreted this as evidence of a period of temperate-climate soil formation, followed by cold climate disturbance.
Thickness: Up to 14 m.
Geographical Limits: Limited to the area around Tottenhill, Norfolk.
Parent Unit: Briton's Lane Formation (BRLA)
Previous Name(s): Tottenhill Gravels [Obsolete Name and Code: Use TOTL] (-4934)
Alternative Name(s): Tottenhill Member
Stratotypes:
Type Section  Sand and gravel pit northwest of Tottenhill village - sections are no longer exposed as the pit is flooded. Gallois, 1978. 
Reference(s):
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). 
Lewis, S G and Rose, J. 1991. Tottenhill, Norfolk (TF 639120). 131-143 in Lewis, S G, Whiteman, A and Bridgland, D (editors), Central East Anglia and the Fen Basin; Field Guide. [London: Quaternary Research Association.] 
Whitaker, W and Jukes-Browne, A J. 1899. The geology of the borders around The Wash: including Boston and Hunstanton. Memoir of the Geological Survey of England and Wales. 
Gallois, R W. 1978. The Pleistocene history of West Norfolk. Bulletin of the Geological Society of Norfolk, Vol.30, 3-38. 
Gibbard, P L, West, R G, Andrew, R and Pettit, M. 1991. Tottenhill, Norfolk [TF 636 115], Central East Anglian and Fen Basin Field Guide, 131-143. Lewis, S Gm Whiteman, A, Bridgland and Davis (editors). Vol 1991. [London: Quaternary Research Associaton]. 
Whitaker, W, Skertchley, S B J and Jukes-Browne, A J. 1893. The geology of south-western Norfolk and of northern Cambridgeshire. Memoir of the Geological Survey of England and Wales. 
1:50K maps on which the lithostratigraphical unit is found, and map code used:
E159 E145