22.
ECCLESIASTICAL FOSSIL
On a recent trip across the border into Suffolk
with some friends I came upon the church of Stratford
St. Mary standing on a small mound quite close to
the main Ipswich road. Now every church seems to
have some unique feature of its own and this was no
exception. At knee-high level, virtually encircling
the church there appeared a Latin inscription
beautifully set with sandstone inlaid with flints.
Inside the church was a translation and whilst my
companions were studying this I had wandered off
and found something which was, to me, or more interest.
Set in the floor was a commemorative flagstone. It
was not the elaborate carving which held my attention
but a tiny "flaw" in the slate. This was a graptolite,
a fossil representative of a group of marine animals
which became extinct in the Palaeozoic era.
Graptolites are extremely valuable fossils to
stratigraphers in zoning of rocks ranging from late
Cambrian to the Devonian on account of their wide
range and relatively rapid evolution.
On my various visits to Pembrokeshire the only
graptolites I had come across were of the "tuning-
fork" type (see below). My specimen was probably
Monograptus convolutus. This being so, the slate in
which it was preserved was undoubtedly from the
Llandovery stage of the Silurian period.