The INQUA Loess Commission goes from Budapest to

Beijing, and then returns to Europe (1991-2003)

Ian Smalley, Greta Smalley, John Howarth, Hugh Nugent

Giotto Loess Research Group, Geography Department,

Leicester University, Leicester LE1 7RH, UK (ijs4@le.ac.uk)

Very few things happen at the right time, and the rest do not happen

at all. The conscientious historian will correct these defects. Herodotus

Abstract

The INQUA Loess Commission existed from 1961 to 2003. Its

history can be divided into three phases; it was initially very

much an institution of Central Europe, but world-wide loess

interests were eventually incorporated. In 1991 An Zhi-sheng

of the Chinese Academy of Sciences became president, and

it entered its third and final phase of existence. Several

landmark events occurred in the third phase; eventually it

contracted back to Europe, and was wound up (with all the

other INQUA commissions) in 2003.

The rich package of events in phase 3 suggests that long

running commissions accumulate value and can contribute

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significantly to scientific endeavours. Time is required to

build the interactions so critical to science.

Keywords: INQUA Loess Commission; worldwide loess

studies; Heidelberg/Bonn LoessFest; Hardcastle centenary;

Moscow Loess/Carbon meeting; NATO Soil Collapse meeting;

scientific communication

1. Introduction Loess

research was encouraged and guided and influenced by the

INQUA Loess Commission. INQUA, the International Union for

Quaternary Research, correlated and organised research into

Quaternary science, largely by the operation of

commissions; groups of like-minded scholars and

investigators. One of the most significant, and best recorded,

of the commissions was the Loess Commission- devoted to

the study and investigation of loess sediments and soils. A

study of the commissions is useful, not just for simple

historical reasons after Herodotus, but because it is useful to

see scientific endeavour in action, with a view to offering

better provisions and proposals for scientific futures.

The Loess Commission started as a Subcommission of the

Stratigraphy Commission in 1961, became a full commission

in 1969, and was disbanded (along with all extant

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commissions) in 2003. The life of the commission has been

divided into three phases (1); the first phase (1961-1977),

when it was a small scale study group, and Julius Fink of the

University of Vienna was president; the second phase (1977-

1991) when it expanded from Europe and widened its scope

of study, when Marton Pecsi of the Hungarian Academy of

Sciences was president, and the third phase (1991-2003)

when there was consolidation and discussion and recording

and the presidents were An Zhi-sheng of the Chinese

Academy of Sciences and Ian Smalley of the Giotto Loess

Research Group of Leicester University.

Phase 3 shows some signs of the community building of

phases 1 and 2 having an effect and there were several

major meetings. The time period includes four INQUA

Congresses; the 13th in Beijing(1991), the 14th in

Berlin(1995), the 15th in Durban(1999), and the 16th in

Reno(2003). At the Reno meeting the whole structure of

INQUA was refigured and the commissions were terminated,

which provides a neat closed package for the study of the

Loess Commission (the ‘philately of Newfoundland’ effect).

Phases 1 and 2 have been discussed earlier(1), the current

discussion concerns phase 3.

2. Beijing 1991.

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Phase 3 begins in China, at the 13th INQUA Congress in

Beijing. INQUA time progresses from congress to congress,

going forward in a series of four year leaps. Major decisions

are taken at the congresses and new projects initiated.

Marton Pecsi retired as president of the Loess Commission

and phase 2, the expansion phase, ended. Phase 3 was to be

a phase of consolidation and recording. The 1985 WPWG

meeting, and then the Beijing 1991 Congress, re-established

China in the leading position in loess science, and that was

one aim achieved. As phase 3 progressed it was necessary

to demonstrate that Pecsi’s two initiatives had been

effective. A definitive position in geo-engineering needed to

be established, and the loess in Russia, and the loess

literature in Russian, needed to be appreciated. Also the

Loess Commission was required to play its part in INQUA in

general, and to contribute to the overall aims of Quaternary

science.

The loess activity at the Beijing congress included a

symposium to honour John Hardcastle(2). It was the

centenary of Hardcastle’s observation of the link between

climate and loess deposition; Hardcastle’s description of the

loess as a ‘climate register’ and the recognition of significant

layers in the loess deposit at Timaru was, in effect, the

beginning of loess stratigraphy. Stratigraphy was the major

activity in loess research in 1991.

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There was progress on the engineering/practical aspects of

loess research and in April 1994 a NATO supported

conference on collapsible soils was held at Loughborough

University; this turned out to be the major move in the

engineering direction and provided a significant basis for

further studies on hydrocollapse and subsidence- by far the

most widespread and damaging of the loessic engineering

problems. A major review on subsidence, with some

emphasis on Russian work, was published in 1994(3).

Also in 1994 there was a conference at Royal Holloway-

University of London on ‘Wind blown sediments in the

Quaternary record’(4). At this meeting Ludwig Zoeller

proposed that a major meeting should be held to

commemorate the 175th anniversary of the naming of Loess

by Karl Caesar von Leonhard in Heidelberg.

3. Berlin 1995

The 14th INQUA Congress was held in Berlin in 1995. The

proceedings volume for the NATO Conference of 1994 was

available at Berlin INQUA and demonstrated major progress

on the Pecsi Practical Research front (5). Also Berlin provided

an opportunity for discussion of the Zoeller idea for a major

meeting to celebrate 175 years since Karl Caesar von

Leonhard had named loess, in which to discuss all aspects of

loess. The Zoeller conference began to be seen as an

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opportunity for a major loess meeting which could celebrate

all the achievements of the Loess Commission. It was

becoming apparent that such a conference might be timely

as there were already traces of ideas of re-organisation of

the INQUA structure which would disturb the commission

system.

1995 also saw the publication of the GeoJournal volume on

Loess-Palaeosol investigations edited by Pecsi and

Velichko(6);this printed the INQUA programme and listed

symposia 54-56 in the Loess and Fossil Soils section.

In the early part of 1999 the LoessFest was held in

Heidelberg and Bonn(7). This was the meeting proposed by

Zoeller in 1994 and it brought together loess scholars from

all over the world to discuss a large range of loess topics. It

started in Heidelberg and delegates were able to visit the

type section of loess at Haarlass, and take away a specially

packaged souvenir sample of the actual material. The

LoessFest was a true celebration of loess, and to

demonstrate the forward looking nature of loess scholars it

was the launch meeting for the Dirtmap project(8).

4. Durban 1999

The Durban INQUA Congress came just after the LoessFest

and provided the opportunity for some further loess

discussions. It was becoming obvious that a major

reorganisation was about to be started in the main INQUA

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structures and preparations were made for the closing of the

Loess Commission. An Zhi-sheng handed over the

presidency to Ian Smalley.

The Dirtmap project had been initiated at LoessFest and the

major meeting for this project was held in Jena in October

2000. This allowed worldwide participation in aeolian

research and delegates came from Australia, China and the

United States, and very much met the Pecsi aim of

encouraging world-wide loess study A major volume was

produced(8) and Loess Letter 51 carried reports. The

worldwide nature of loess research was becoming more

visible and more appreciated and in 2001 the Loess

Commission participated in the SEQS meeting in Ukraine.

This was the first major geoscience meeting in Ukraine since

the International Geological Congress in 1984, and it enabled

scholars to obtain an excellent view of the remarkable

Ukraininan loess deposits. Loess Letter, in particular,

supported this meeting (see LLs 45 & 47) and it was a very

successful meeting. The field excursion travelled east from

Kyiv through Lubny round the south-eastern end of the

Dnepr reservoir and back to Kyiv via Cherkassy. At this

meeting Andrei Dodonov and Ian Smalley planned the

Moscow Loess & Carbon meeting for 2003. After the main

meeting a small sub-group examined the Pecherskaya Lavra-

the Monastery of the Caves, which is built in and on the loess

beside the Dnepr in Kyiv. The extensive tunnel systems built

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by the monks are made in the loess and provide a very

impressive underground loess construction. There are

various systems of tunnels and cellars and underground

constructions in the loess of eastern Europe, such as in

Lublin and Sandomierz in Poland- a topic for some future,

detailed study.

5. Reno 2003

At the Reno meeting all extant commissions were disbanded

and an era of loess research and scholarship was ended. A

small sub-committee was set-up to pursue the one

outstanding task. Julius Fink had set up a project to map the

European loess, and Gunter Haase in Leipzig had been

placed in charge. This project had proved remarkably

difficult because of organisational, linguistic, cartographical

and political problems. The mapping region spread across

parts of Europe which were in considerable upheaval for the

last third of the 20th Century. In 2003 the map project was

unfinished but considerable material existed, mostly in store

at the Saxon Academy in Leipzig. The map sub-committee

was charged with the task of facilitating a completion, a

closure, of the map project. The active members were

Ludwig Zoeller and Klaus-Dieter Jaeger, they, handily

positioned relative to Leipzig, would encourage completion.

And completion was achieved, the map was published(9)

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with considerable commentary attached, and a special issue

of Loess Letter[#59] was produced to mark the occasion. It

was fitting that the map should be completed in Leipzig

since this was where Grahmann(10) produced the first

detailed map of loess in Europa (reproduced in LL59).

6. Commentary

The early Loess Commission was essentially a small group of

scholars looking at loess in Central Europe, it really was a

Central European enterprise(1). In 1977 the scope became

larger, more technological and more international. The

Western Pacific Working Group represented the acme of

internationality(11) and the last hurrah was the

Loess/Carbon conference in Moscow in 2003(12). The history

of the Commission demonstrated the value of a large, long-

lasting Commission within the INQUA structure. Time and

space allowed many interactions to develop, and

interactions promote science and discovery. The action of

the Western Pacific Working Group facilitated the return of

Chinese scholars to the world community after the disruption

of the Cultural Revolution and the long running newsletter

provided a link for the widespread loess community.

References

1. Smalley,I.J., Markovic,S.B., O’Hara-Dhand,K. 2010.

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The INQUA Loess Commission as a Central European

enterprise. Central European Journal of Geosciences

2, 3-8.

2. Smalley, I.J. 1983. John Hardcastle on glacier motion and

glacial loess. Journal of Glaciology 29, 480-484. (reprinted in

Loess Letter Supplement 23, November 1988 for 13th INQUA

at Beijing).

3. Rogers, C.D.F., Dijkstra, T.A., Smalley, I.J. 1994.

Hydroconsolidation and subsidence of loess: studies from

China, Russia, North America and Europe. Engineering

Geology 37, 83-113.

4. Derbyshire, E. (ed.) 1995. Wind blown sediments in the

Quaternary record. Quaternary Proceedings 4, pp.1-96.

5. Derbyshire, E., Dijkstra, T.A., Smalley, I.J.(eds.) 1995.

Genesis and Properties of Collapsible Soils. (NATO ASI series

C, Maths.& Physical Science 468) Kluwer 424p.

6. Pecsi, M., Velichko, A.A.(eds.) 1995. Loess-paleosol and

paleoclimatic investigations; principles, methods and

criteria. GeoJournal 36, pp.115-294.

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7. Derbyshire, E. (ed.) 1999. Loess: characterization,

stratigraphy, climate and societal significance (LoessFest

1999), Proceedings pp.1-272.

8. Derbyshire, E. (ed.) 2003. Loess, and dust indicators and

records of terrestrial and marine palaeoenvironments

(Dirtmap) database. Quaternary Science Reviews 22,

pp.1813-2052.

9. Haase,D., Fink,J., Haase,G., Ruske,R., Pecsi,M.,

Richter,H., Alterman,M., Jaeger,K.D., 2007. Loess in

Europe- its spatial distribution based on a European loess

Map, scale 1: 2,500,00. Quaternary Science Reviews 26,

1301-1312.

10. Grahmann, R. 1932. Der Loss in Europa. Mitteilungen

der Gesellschaft fur Erdkunde Leipzig 51, 5-24.(maps

reprinted in Loess Letter 59 April 2008).

11. Smalley, I.J., O’Hara-Dhand, K. 2010. The Western

Pacific Working Group of the INQUA Loess Commission;

expansion from Central Europe. Central European Journal of

Geosciences 2, 9-14 (reprinted in Loess Letter 63, 25-31,

April 2010).

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12. Velichko, A.A., Dodonov, A.E., Catto, N.R. 2006. Loess

and palaeoenvironments across Eurasia: dedicated to the

memory of Marton Pecsi. Quaternary International 152/153,

1-201.

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