Sarsen stone, Old Watling Street, Strood
Introduction
The photograph on this page of Sarsen stone, Old Watling Street, Strood by David Kemp as part of the Geograph project.
The Geograph project started in 2005 with the aim of publishing, organising and preserving representative images for every square kilometre of Great Britain, Ireland and the Isle of Man.
There are currently over 7.5m images from over 14,400 individuals and you can help contribute to the project by visiting https://www.geograph.org.uk
Sarsen stone, Old Watling Street, Strood
Image: © David Kemp Taken: 8 Nov 2015
This stone and another stand near the corner of Old Watling Street and the A1. Sarsens were formed in Miocene times by a process of siliceous cementation within pre-existing strata of fine quartz sandstones. Whereas the sandstones were in due course eroded, the much harder sarsens have survived and are still to be seen in North Kent and in many other parts of south-east England. The matter of how this stone acquired its smoothly rounded, convex surfaces remains unresolved. Were existing mamillary concretions cemented together to form the configuration seen here or was the latter the product of a single episode of cementation?
Images are licensed for reuse under creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0
Image Location
Latitude
51.398958
Longitude
0.455936