Neptunism

Definitions

noun A geological doctrine, chiefly developed and supported by A. G. Werner (1750–1817), professor in the Mining Academy of Freiberg, Saxony, according to which the ancient crystalline schists and gneisses and even later basalts when inter-stratified with obvious sedimentary rocks, were precipitated from solution in the ocean: also Wernerianism: the opposite of Plutonism or Huttonianism.

proper noun historical A discredited scientific theory of geology, held by many scientists around the late 18th century and early 19th century, that rocks were formed from the crystallisation of minerals in the early Earth's oceans.

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As professor at Freiberg beginning in 1775, after, rather than before Guettard's work, he trained the students who, returning to their own countries, spread the new science which he called "geognosy" but they called "Wernerism" and "Neptunism."

Vulcanists & Neptunists Schneer, Cecil J. 1966
Bouvard inclined towards Neptunism; Pécuchet, on the contrary, was a

Bouvard and Pécuchet A Tragi-comic Novel of Bourgeois Life Gustave Flaubert 1850
He believed that all rock was once sediment or precipitate in a universal ocean, a view which became known as Neptunism.

The Brussels Journal - The Voice of Conservatism in Europe 2009