Origin of Amber

Manawatu Times, Volume 61, Issue 44, 22 February 1936, Page 15

Origin of Amber

Amber is found in many countries. It is particularly abundant on the shores of the Baltic, but is also found in Sicily, the Indian Seas, China, North America and Madagascar. The following facts show that the origin of amber goes back to the tertiary epoch, and that it. is to bo assigned to a resin which - flowed from the trunks of certain trees of that era.

We find amber in beds of tertiary lignites, in the form of numerous fragments lying between the trunks of amber trees. It is true that this substance has never been found adhering directly to any of the trunks; but the position of the fragments seem to admit of no doubt. The analogy between copal and amber evidently indicates a similar origin. Their consistency, their colour, their nature, and the fact that they both enclose organic remains, prove their resemblance and show that amber, like copal, and many modern resins and gums, has flowed from the trunk and branches of a vegetable. It is probable that the large and irregular masses are the produce of the trunk, that the smaller ones have come from the branches, and that those which have a slaty structure have been formed by a series of layers. The roots probably produced none. The great quantity thrown up by the Baltic Sea is probably owing to the existence of a considerable bed, situated in the south-west quarter of the present basin of that sea. This must have been the principal place where Baltic amber was formed, and the site of the forest which produced it. This forest probably flourished on a low island which marine curronts issuing from the north subsequently submerged and destroyed.