.Second Edition, published by Oliver and Boyd, 1939, hardcover, illustrated, 41 plates and 68 text-figures, index, 539 pages, large fold-out geological map of South Africa to back board, no dust jacket, condition: as new
Du Toit was a South African geologist, He was an early supporter of Wegener's theory of continental drift. In 1903, du Toit was appointed as a geologist within the Geological Commission of the Cape of Good Hope, and began to develop an extensive knowledge of the geology of southern Africa by mapping large portions of the Karoo and its dolerite intrusions, publishing numerous papers on the subject. He mapped the entire Karoo System through the complete stratigraphy from Dwyka tillite to the basalt of the Drakensberg. Du Toit worked at a furious rate and was known for his painstaking meticulousness.In 1927, du Toit became chief consulting geologist to De Beers Consolidated Mines.
Du Toit published a review of the stratigraphic and radioisotope evidence from those regions that supported Wegener's ideas, "A Geological Comparison of South America with South Africa (1927)". "Our Wandering Continents (1937)", expanded and improved this work. He proposed two original supercontinents separated by the Tethys Ocean, a northern/equatorial Laurasia and a southern/polar Gondwanaland. He was able to demonstrate and follow the predicted continuation of specific features that he had already documented in Southern Africa, into the continent of South America. Although it might perhaps seem less impressive to the layman, that evidence was far more convincing to the geologist than was the matching of continental shelves.The book still bears reading for its creative and closely argued theses in the light of the geology of the day, and is soberingly consistent with modern principles of plate tectonics.
A 75 km crater on Mars (71.8°S, 49.7°W) was named "Du Toit" in recognition of his work.
