980

The formation of mountains.

That the Northern bases of some Alps are not yet petrified. And this is plainly to be seen where the rivers, which cut through them, flow towards the North; where they cut through the strata in the living stone in the higher parts of the mountains; and, where they join the plains, these strata are all of potter’s clay; as is to be seen in the valley of Lamona where the river Lamona, as it issues from the Appenines, does these things on its banks.

That the rivers have all cut and divided the mountains of the great Alps one from the other. This is visible in the order of the stratified rocks, because from the summits of the banks, down to the river the correspondence of the strata in the rocks is visible on either side of the river. That the stratified stones of the mountains are all layers of clay, deposited one above the other by the various floods of the rivers. That the different size of the strata is caused by the difference in the floods—that is to say greater or lesser floods.

Taken from The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci edited by Jean Paul Richter, 1880.

Notebooks of Leonoardo da Vinci
XVI: Physical Geography.
. . .
960
Theory of the circulation of the waters.
961,
962
Observations in support of the hypothesis.
963,
964,
965,
966,
967,
968,
969
On the way in which the sources of rivers are fed.
970
The tide in estuaries.
971
confluence.
972,
973,
974
Whirlpools.
975
On the alterations in the channels of rivers.
976
The origin of the sand in rivers.
977,
978
The formation of mountains.
979,
980,
981,
982,
983
The authorities for the study of the structure of the earth.
984,
985
Doubts about the deluge.
986
That marine shells could not go up the mountains.
987
The marine shells were not produced away from the sea.
988
Further researches.
989,
990,
991
Other problems.
992,
993,
994
Constituents of the atmosphere.
995
On the motion of air.
996,
997,
998,
999
The globe an organism.
1000
. . .