George Tate (1805-1871) of Alnwick, an amateur Victorian polymath, and his contribution to geology in Northumberland and southeast Scotland

Abstract

George Tate, draper, postmaster and insurance agent, was not only a renowned civic figure during the mid-nineteenth century in his home town of Alnwick but was also, despite limited schooling, a widely celebrated and influential writer on the geology, biology, archaeology and history of Northumberland and adjacent parts of Scotland. His principal geological interests were wide ranging but in the main were devoted to the stratigraphy and palaeontology of the lower part of the Carboniferous System in his local area. Some of the lithostratigraphical terminology he proposed remained in use into the 1950s and, despite changes in nomenclature, elements of his classification can still be recognised in the modern lithostratigraphy. He put forward much evidence for the intrusive origin of the Whin Sill when it was still regarded by many of his contemporaries as a lava flow. Tate was among the first to describe and discuss the evidence in Northumberland and southeast Scotland for the then novel idea that Britain had been subjected to the influence of ice in the recent geological past. His brother and two of his sons attended Edinburgh University and had distinguished professional careers. His nephew, Ralph, inherited much of his uncle's wide interests and became a highly celebrated figure in the development of geology in Australia.