The Age of the Ore Deposits of the Lake District and of the Alston Block

Abstract

There is a lead-zinc (with subsidiary copper) metallogenic province on each side of the Vale of Eden. To the east the veins of the Alston Block are found in Carboniferous rocks and a Hercynian age is the generally accepted date of the mineralization. To the west the veins lie in the Lower Palaeozoic rocks of the Lake District. Within the latter area ore-veins associated with the Shap Granite are, by common consent, regarded as of Caledonian age. But these apart, there is a regional mineralization in the Lake District, best developed in the northern part of that topographical unit, which has also been regarded as of Hercynian age.