Book reviews : Cahen, L., Snelling, N.J., Delhal,J. and Vail, J.R. with the assistance of Bonhomme, M. and Ledent, D. 1984: The geochronology and evolution of Africa. Oxford: Oxford University Press. xiii + 512 pp. £60.00
Abstract
Book reviewsCahen, L., Snelling, N.J., Delhal,J. and Vail, J.R. with the assistance of Bonhomme, M. and Ledent, D. 1984: The geochronology and evolution of Africa. Oxford: Oxford University Press. xiii + 512 pp. £60.00 SAGE Publications, Inc.1986DOI: 10.1177/030913338601000410 T.C. Partridge University of the Witwatersrand This authoritative synthesis translates into reality the dream of the late Arthur Holmes that a comprehensive body of radiometric age determinations could provide the basis for continent-wide geological correlations and evolutionary syntheses. It is a fitting tribute to Holmes's vision that one of his most distinguished collaborators in Africa, Lucien Cahen, was, with the aid of his coauthors, able to prepare the manuscript for publication before his death in 1982. The result is a work of fundamental importance, not only for students of African geology, but for all those interested in the evolution of Precambrian terrains. It is, and will surely remain for many years to come, the definitive statement on the early geochronology and geological history of this complex continent. Several factors combine to make this book a unique and invaluable work of reference. In the first place, it assembles a vast array of chronometric data from disparate sources; more importantly large numbers