This hand colored antique scientific engraving sold at Trillium for $2,300.50; the presale high estimate was $1,000.

Catalog notes for Trillium lot 4832

This scientific engraving is Athanasius Kircher's d'Onder-Aardse Weereld in Haar Goddelijk Maaksel en wonderbare uitwerkselen aller Dingen... It was published in 1682 in Amsterdam by J. Janssonius van Waasberge. This was the first Dutch translation of the original Latin edition entitled Mundus subterraneus. This work was drew from Kircher's visit to Sicily in 1637-8 when Etna and Stromboli both erupted. This observation led him to conclude that the earth's center as a massive internal fire and that volcanoes acted as safety valves.

His work speculated on geology, hidden lakes, rivers of fire, strange inhabitants, the sun, the moon, eclipses, currents, meteorology, medicines, poisons, and even fireworks.

The work “must always command a high place in the literature as the first effort to describe the earth from a physical standpoint.” (Zittel, p. 25)

Athanasius Kircher (1601-1680) was a Jesuit priest and scholar. He gathered and helped disseminate knowledge from around the world gathered by Jesuit missionaries. It is believed he was the first to depict the Pacific Ring of Fire on a map. He was one of the final Renaissance men. He lowered himself into Vesuvius after an eruption, experimented with bioluminescence as a light source, and make the first known Aeolian harp.

He wrote 44 books, over 2000 manuscripts, and assembled one of the first natural history collections. Kircher's work was itself fascinating for its thematic maps. His work was on the underground passages and subterranean networks of the globe. He created a map that was the first to show ocean currents.

Paper Size: ~ 22 3/4" by 15" (Fold Out) Paper Type or Special Features: Engraving with Professional Hand-coloring

This photo was taken at the edge of the Niagara Escarpment in the Dundas Valley (southern Ontario). It's rather unusual around there and I'm puzzled by it.

The escarpment edge here is Lockport dolomite, without much obvious karst formation - very little in the way of fractured and eroded surface rock. The hole itself is old enough that the exposed rock looks to be as eroded as the nearby cliff face.

My best guess is that it's a sinkhole from which the loose limestone blocks have been removed.

I saw a recent analogy by someone, saying that if lab grown diamonds aren’t real diamonds, then ice made in your freezer isn’t real ice. In trying to explain how it’s different, I couldn’t actually find a flaw. They’re both not naturally occurring because a human interfered, placed the materials needed into a chamber that has the optimal conditions, and created a man made crystalline object, virtually identical to the naturally occurring mineral. Thoughts?

I really like silly puns and jokes.

I’m looking for a bunch of jokes like this: “if you roll an emerald across the the floor that’s a Beryl roll.”

Edit: Thank you all for the amazing comments! I will be trying to use a bunch of these.

https://techxplore.com/news/2026-10-collapse-earthquake-stay.html

Saw this outcrop at Manastash Vista Point off of I-82 East in Ellensburg, WA. I didn’t have much time to look, just got out to help my toddler use the bathroom and kept moving. Took a few pics. Wondering if anyone knows about the contacts within the basalt. I’m curious about the clastic (sedimentary) dike with bedding, and the yellow/green rocks above the clastic dike (at the base of the basalt nearest ground surface. Pics posted.

Edit: I called the strata with bedding a clastic dike. Please forgive my error, as a clastic dike wouldn’t include bedding. I’m puzzled by this feature…it doesn’t appear to be soft sediment deformation so how would sandstone bedding like this end up truncated above and below by basalt?

The photos are from a drainage ditch in my neighborhood, it cuts very deep with some of the creek walls reaching 20 feet tall. I’ve always been curious about these different layers, especially the hard, almost concrete like layer in the second photo. Any information would be cool. Thanks!

Central Alabama, north of Montgomery

When recently traversing the Atacama Desert by way of route B-710, I saw a system of holes that puzzled me since. I think they're related to a seismic study and would like someone to chime in and confirm.

If you go to 24°26'39.74"S 70°19'06.21"W using your favorite satellite image viewer (e.g., earth.google.com), you can see these yourself. From N to S, you'll see a straight line made up of holes that measure approx 4m x 2m x 1.5m (L x W x H) that run parallel to the B-710. There are some lines that intersect the B-710 too. I count approx 20 of these per km and they run for a good 12.5km.

Using the history feature in earth.google, these date back to pre 1985 (that's the farthest back I could go). They were very blurry, but I was able to make them out.

Any geonerds know what all this is about?

Note: I doubt these are mining related because if they were, one would see these kinds of lines all over the region, but no.

In the images, one can see the holes in the distance and in another, they appear like the mounds of dirt that one would see in my backyard where I bury all my victims, but that story is in another subreddit. Those mounds are bigger than they appear because in the Atacama, there are few landmarks to help gauge perspective.

See also: The summary of the paywalled study as published in Nature Earth and Environment

I’ve found “clay babies” before wondering if these are like “fossilized” clay babies? Variety of sizes from the size of a quarter up to what you can see in the pictures. Broke them open and nothing of note inside. Found possibly a clam shell fossil with this but hard to say if it was just the way the rock broke. Near the kispiox river in British Columbia.

I am really frustrated with my CS degree. I started back in 2023, I have 3 semesters left. As much as I like problem solving, I don't like doing it like 10 hours a day sitting in front of a computer. I barely know anything outside of my courses. Now, if anyone is thinking why I didn't switch, well I moved to europe from a third world country to study CS, I had the option to switch after 1 year, but I would have to pay for one extended year ( I don't have to pay anything now). But also I did not know what I wanted to study.

I have been frantically looking for smth I might like and not regret it for the rest of my life. I am considering geology. But I am already 22 yrs old. I don't know if getting a second bachelor and finishing it when I'm 26 or 27 will be worth it. But also I don't wanna live in my shithole country, specially because I'm a woman. So I am really gonna need a job as soon as I graduate, or I have to go back to my country.

Life feels just so frustrating atm.

So rills and gully’s are channels that are cut through by erosion by water right from my understanding. So are they more common in higher elevations and they eventually grow wide enough to become rivers? Or do larger sediments impede flow and it will retain the same size? My question might be a little confusing so just let me know if I need to clarify anything.

What is it? How did it get its form? And does it have a name?

Furthest I've gotten is that it's located in the Aseer Province of Saudi Arabia. Labels are quite lacking on Google Earth.

It is located at coordinates

19°08'20.1"N 41°58'26.9"E

Bit stuck on what this thing in the middle is can someone identify it please thank you! (igneous rock containing plag, cpx, olivine)

I live near the foothills in Colorado, and have a very interesting backyard. We have lots of sandstone concretions and quartz. I’m used to seeing bowl shaped deformities in all sorts of rock types caused by natural erosion, but many of these are very deep and narrow, and some have progressed all the way to form tubes. Picture 2 is about 6 inch deep with a 1X2 inch opening. pictures 3-5 are about 18 inches long with a hollow and fairly uniform center, like a straw. I’m guessing this was some sort of very soft cylindrical concretion that eroded out leaving the harder outside sandstone? Either way very cool to see these all over the place!

Sorry if my question is simple! I'm a painter and I like to understand what I paint, but I've been having trouble doing research on rocks. Specifically what inferences I can make about a mountain side. For example I've been using Mount Jomolhari in Bhutan as reference for a piece I've been working on, and while a google search reveals that the majority of the mountain is made of schist, gneiss, and migmatite (I think), I've been having trouble identifying which of those rocks can be found in specific reference images I've been using. I'd love to be able to make inferences on the context of how a rock face was formed, how that impacted the current composition and color/value differences within it and so on. If any rock nerds could point me to some good places to start in terms of scholarly papers, articles, or even trustworthy youtube videos it'd be greatly appreciated!

I've attached an example of a reference image I've been using. If you were me how would you go about analyzing an image like this?

I never been to Matterhorn, it looks amazing on the app.
I made some new changes on the app, hope you like it.
One day I’ll be there in person haha.