Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563

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Earth-Science Reviews
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/earscirev

Petrographic classification of sand and sandstone T

Eduardo Garzanti
Laboratory of Provenance Studies, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Milano-Bicocca, Milano, Italy

ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT

Keywords: Petrographic classifications of sand and sandstone proposed more than half a century ago are still in use, al-
Sandstone petrology though they were formulated at a time when depositional and post-depositional sedimentary processes were
Gazzi-Dickinson method poorly understood, and before the relationships between tectonics and sedimentation could be interpreted in
QFL diagram modern plate-tectonic terms. As a consequence, too many scientific articles and technical reports are still en-
Sediment provenance
cumbered with obsolete concepts, graphical tools, and ambiguous terminology that make sediment descriptions
Plate-tectonic setting
Texture and composition
awkward and misleading. A renovation that treasures the legacy of the pioneers is required.
Greywacke and arkose The descriptive petrographic classification of sand and sandstone proposed in this paper is based on the quasi-
Rock fragments universally used Gazzi-Dickinson point-counting method, and simply translates into words ternary compositions
Chert, carbonate, and evaporite grains of quartz, feldspar, and lithic fragments without introducing any new names. The classic QFL plot is subdivided
Classification of modern river, turbidite, and into 15 fields - labelled by adjectives introduced long ago by K.A.W. Crook and endorsed by W.R. Dickinson and
desert sand more recently by G.J. Weltje - which reflect relative abundances of the three main framework components
(provided they exceed 10%QFL). According to standard use, the less abundant component goes first, the more
abundant last (e.g., litho-feldspatho-quartzose composition translates into Q > F > L > 10%QFL). For lithic-
rich sand and sandstone, information on the prevailing rock fragment type can be added by an additional free
adjective (e.g., metamorphiclastic, carbonaticlastic), as proposed long ago by R.V. Ingersoll. For lithic-poor
feldspatho-quartzose and quartzose sand and sandstone, further formal subdivisions are proposed based on the
Q/F ratio, thus reaching a total of 18 compositional fields overall. Modern sand known to be derived from
different source rocks and found in major world's rivers, deserts, and deep-sea fans fits in the pigeonholes defined
by the relative abundance of quartz, feldspar, and lithic fragments.
The aim of this classification is to restore directness in sandstone petrology, and to avoid ambiguities gen-
erated in the past by making reference to badly defined archetypes, such as greywacke or arkose, thus confusing
petrographic composition with subjective considerations about plate-tectonic setting, texture, hydraulic beha-
viour, mechanical durability, or chemical durability in the illusion that a classification could be genetic at the
same time as descriptive.

“You ask what is the use of classification, arrangement,
systematization? I answer you: order and simplification are the first
steps toward the mastery of a subject — the actual enemy is the
unknown.”
(Thomas Mann, The Magic Mountain, Encyclopaedic)
1. Introduction
The petrographic study of sedimentary archives is one of the many
keys to deciphering geological history. The road is, however, long and
winding, and a firm methodological approach is essential to staying on
track. This article reviews operational and conceptual flaws of tradi-
tional classification criteria and suggests how to describe and classify in
a clear and exhaustive way the composition of sand or sandstone
samples in a scientific article or technical report. The straightforward
scheme proposed here - which focuses strictly on petrographic com-
position, expressly neglecting texture, hydraulic behaviour, resistance
to weathering, transport, or diagenesis - is intended to be efficient and
efficacious at the same time.
After the invention of thin-section petrography by Sorby (1880),
sedimentary-petrology studies started to flourish in the first half of the
twentieth century, and culminated with sandstone classifications pro-
posed in numbers between the late 1940s and the early 1960s (as
summarized in Klein, 1963; Okada, 1971; Scholle, 1979). These clas-
sification schemes (Figs. 1, 2) inevitably suffered from the level of in-
formation available at the time about sedimentary and geodynamic
processes. Investigations on diagenetic transformations were limited,
and the nature of interstitial phyllosilicates in sandstone consequently

E-mail address: eduardo.garzanti@unimib.it.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.earscirev.2018.12.014
Received 18 October 2018; Received in revised form 16 December 2018; Accepted 18 December 2018
Available online 27 December 2018
0012-8252/ © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
E. Garzanti Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563

(caption on next page)

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E. Garzanti
Fig. 1. Traditional sandstone classifications based on petrographic composition. Note major differences in nomenclature and definition of end-members and com-
positional fields. Chert is either grouped with quartz in Krynine's, Hubert's, early Folk's, and McBride's QFR plots to emphasize durability, but with rock fragments in
van Andel's and late Folk's QFR plots to emphasize provenance. In the genetic Dickinson's scheme, based instead on the Gazzi-Dickinson method and on the inferred
correspondence between detrital modes and geodynamic setting, chert is grouped with quartz in the QtFL plot and with lithic fragments in the QmFLt plot, whereas
carbonate rock fragments are excluded.
poorly understood. Before advent of the plate-tectonic theory, re-
lationships between tectonics and sedimentation were still immersed in
a panorama full of mythological entities, including the large geosyn-
cline clan (Krynine, 1948; Kay, 1951; Folk, 1968).
Irruption of the new geodynamic paradigm in the 1960s and 1970s
revolutionized the petrological study of terrigenous rocks as well,
leading to novel ideas embodied in the genetic sandstone-classification
scheme of Dickinson (Dickinson, 1985; Dickinson and Suczek, 1979)
that has dominated the scene since then. The enthusiasm generated by
such a major conceptual step forward, however, created the illusion
that sediments generated in different plate-tectonic settings should in-
evitably plot in separate fields within a QFL diagram. The uncritical use
of such a simple graphic tool as a passkey to paleogeodynamic inter-
pretation has resisted the objections manifested in subsequent years
(e.g., Mack, 1984; Molinaroli et al., 1991; Weltje, 2006), ending up as a
ready-made approach that has all too often contributed to sterilization
of petrological research.
This conservative attitude has persisted. Even in recent scientific
articles, it is common to find cumbersome petrographic descriptions
based on obsolete classification schemes or awkward terms such as
arkose or greywacke, the use of which has been contested since their
early introduction two centuries ago. In too many cases, genetic inter-
pretations are still based on the belief that numerical parameters
readily obtained by petrographic analysis may open an easy way to the
reconstruction of paleogeographic and paleogeodynamic scenarios. A
fundamental misunderstanding rooted in the past (Pettijohn, 1948
p.113; Rodgers, 1950 p.299) is that a classification could, and even
should be at the same time both descriptive and genetic (i.e., objective
and subjective). Sediment mineralogy, however, reflects the multiple
superposed effects of numerous controlling factors, including source-
rock lithology, climate, and tectonic activity, together with diverse
physical and chemical processes affecting detritus through one or more
sedimentary cycles. Complex equations with many unknowns cannot be
solved in one leap.
2. Why a classification should not be genetic
Whenever we find ourselves baffled by the variety and complexity
of nature's products and phenomena, we may start to make compar-
isons, look for similarities and differences, and finally combat chaos by
dividing objects into categories and giving them a name. A classifica-
tion is a simple artificial means to impose order upon the real world.
This process leads to the formulation of a language that, when widely
agreed upon, allows us to exchange information. Words, however, do
not only technically describe objects, but also create suggestions. Not
differently from myth and religion, scientific theories grow with new
words, the spell of which may help to conceal the unbridgeable distance
separating our models from truth. In the geosciences, evocative words
have always been used to depict processes and scenarios which, once
meeting wide consensus, proved easy to believe and difficult to depart
from (Dickinson, 2003). In order to make diligent use of reason, digest
observations, and progress on the infinite stairway to knowledge,
however, we need to focus on naked phenomena, stripped of rhetoric,
superposed scent of incense, and special effects of any kind. Sharp
reasoning needs clear words and concepts devoid of ambiguities and
implicit assumptions.
A classification, therefore, should be no more than a basic tool, an
attempt to communicate reality in a direct way. An efficient descriptive
language cannot substitute for understanding, but may represent the
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Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563
first step on the path toward understanding. Hoping that the goal can be
reached without making the journey is laziness. Believing that en-
lightenment may come in a moment is illusory. The commandment
“genesis must and does permeate our classification” (Pettijohn, 1948
p.113) or the promise that plotting a point into a QFL diagram is suf-
ficient to reveal a geodynamic context (Dickinson and Suczek, 1979)
are traps into which we should not fall.
3. Why a QFL plot cannot reveal geodynamic setting
Plate tectonics is the best paradigm at our disposal to describe
geological processes at planetary scale. This does not mean that full
understanding has been reached, and several key questions remain
unanswered about the processes that shape the face of our planet. We
are still debating when and how plate tectonics began on Earth, why
plates are moving, what drives oceanic and continental subduction,
whether plates breakoff at depth, what forces cause subsidence in
orogen-related basins, or what triggers gigantic outbursts of magmas
(e.g., Hamilton, 2011; Korenaga, 2013; Doglioni and Panza, 2015;
Garzanti et al., 2017a). Tectonic processes are reflected in sediment
composition, and sedimentary petrology thus represents one fruitful
way to extrapolate knowledge acquired in modern settings to re-
construct tectonic evolution throughout the geological past. Using se-
diment composition as a key to paleogeodynamics is the fundamental
idea underlying the work of W.R. Dickinson and co-workers (e.g.,
Dickinson and Suczek, 1979; Ingersoll and Suczek, 1979), an idea that
stands as valid as ever. Significant parts of the operative procedure,
however, need to be revised.
As shown by Molinaroli et al. (1991) and Weltje (2006), the un-
critical use of Dickinson's plots is bound to meet with limited success,
and not only because relevant factors such as grain-size control, sam-
pling scale, and environmental or diagenetic bias are neglected
(Ingersoll, 1990; Johnsson, 1993; Weltje and von Eynatten, 2004; Basu,
2017) but also and more fundamentally because some implicit as-
sumptions about sediment generation embodied in this model are in-
valid. These include the tenet that vast areas covered by continental
flood basalts cannot supply large amounts of detritus to sedimentary
basins, even though anorogenic volcanic signatures characterize vast
transcontinental river systems such as the Nile, the Orange, or to a
lesser extent the Yang Tze (Garzanti et al., 2006a, 2012; Vezzoli et al.,
2016). Flawed is also the hope that petrographic analysis alone could
discriminate between detritus shed from neometamorphic domains
forming the axial core of young mountain belts versus paleometa-
morphic detritus derived from old orogenic roots exposed in cratonic
shields or uplifted on the shoulders of continental rifts. In the lack of
information from detrital geochronology and geochemistry, orogenic
sandstone shed from thrust belts and magmatic arcs cannot be safely
distinguished from anorogenic sandstone derived from continental
blocks and flood basalts (e,g., Garzanti et al., 2015b). Framework pet-
rography cannot tell us whether source rocks are allochthonous or
autochthonous. Therefore, orogenic and anorogenic provenances
cannot be discriminated without additional geological information, and
geodynamic setting cannot be univocally inferred from detrital modes
of sandstone alone (Garzanti, 2016).
4. Why a petrographic classification should not consider texture
Texture and composition are independent variables. Texture of
clastic sediments is primarily defined by parameters measuring the
E. Garzanti Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563

characteristics of the grain-size distribution in progressive detail, i.e.,
average (mean, median, mode), uniformity (sorting), asymmetry
(skewness), and peakedness (kurtosis; Folk, 1966), whereas composi-
tion is defined by the relative percentages of framework components,
i.e., single minerals and rock fragments. The repeated attempts to
combine in a single classification scheme compositional, textural, and
even hydraulic properties at the same time (provenance, maturity, and
fluidity factors of Pettijohn, 1954) has created much confusion since the
dawn of sandstone petrography (Table 1; Klein, 1963 p.569–570) and
still reverberates in the appearance of ambiguous obsolete names in the
recent geological literature.
The emblematic example is the archaic term greywacke, used ori-
ginally by miners to describe hand specimens and successively adopted
in the geological literature to indicate a generic lithic-rich composition
as well as colour (grey), texture (poorly sorted, supposedly matrix-rich),
and depositional environment (turbidite). The crux of ambiguity stems
from putting composition and texture in the same basket (Fig. 2), often
implying that “immature” composition (i.e., low quartz) should ne-
cessarily combine with “immature” texture (i.e., poor sorting). For in-
stance, in Pettijohn (1954 p.362) we read: “compositional maturity is
rarely attained without a corresponding achievement of textural maturity”.
Many sandstone petrographers thus shared Packham's (1954) view that
a “greywacke suite” deposited by turbidity currents could be dis-
tinguished from an “arkose-quartzose sandstone suite” deposited by
traction currents (McBride, 1963; Crook, 1974), a dichotomy that has
no basis (Okada, 1966; Garzanti, 2017). The tangle tightened since

Fig. 2. Traditional sandstone classifications based on both petrographic composition and texture. In Pettijohn's, Gilbert's, Packham's, and Crook's schemes, two
different triangular diagrams are proposed for matrix-rich turbiditic greywackes deposited by high-viscosity fluids distinguished from cleaner arkose-quartzose
arenites deposited by low-density fluids. Diverse tridimensional diagrams were also devised to take into account what Pettijohn (1954 p.360, 363) believed to be the
three factors “of greatest genetic importance in the classification of sandstones”, i.e.: “provenance, maturity, and fluidity of the depositing medium”. Adding texture as a fourth
component of the sacred QFR triad, however, involves nomenclatural, graphical, and conceptual confusion (e.g., turbidites are not necessarily matrix-rich, pseu-
domatrix being commonly generated by post-depositional alteration of labile rock fragments; Okada, 1966; Whetten, 1969; Dickinson, 1970).

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Table 1
Criteria used in the classification of sandstone through the last 70 years.
Article Year Composition Mineralogical Tectonic Texture, mud Quartz-rich sand/ Feldspar-rich Lithic-rich sand/ Polycrystalline Chert Carbonate Mica Clay
durability setting content sandstone sand/sandstone sandstone quartz grains grains matrix

Krynine 1948 X – X – Orthoquartzite Arkose Low-rank graywacke Pole Q Pole Q ? Pole R Kaolin in
pole F
Folk 1954 X X – – Orthoquartzite Arkose Graywacke Pole R Pole Q – Pole R –
Van Andel 1958 X X – – Quartzose sandstone Arkose Graywacke pole Q pole R ? – –
Pettijohn 1949 X X – X Quartzite Arkosite – Pole R Pole Q – – Pole M
Pettijohn 1954–57 X X – X Orthoquartzite Arkose Subgraywacke Pole R Pole Q – – 4th pole
Dapples et al. 1953 X X – X Quartzose sandstone Arkose Graywacke Pole Q Pole Q ? pole R pole R
Williams et al. 1953 X X – X Quartz arenite / wacke Arkosic arenite/ Lithic arenite / wacke pole Q Pole Q ? – –
wacke
Gilbert 1954 X X – X Quartz arenite / wacke Arkosic arenite / Lithic arenite / wacke Pole Q Pole Q Pole R – ?
wacke

549
Bokman 1955 X X – X Orthoquartzite Arkose Lithic sandstone Pole Q Pole Q ? ? pole M
Packham 1954 X X – X Quartzose sandstone/ Arkose/labile Labile sandstone/ Pole Q Pole Q ? ? pole M
subgraywacke graywacke labile graywacke
Crook 1960 X (X) – X Quartzose arenite Feldspathic / labile Lithic / labile arenite Pole Q Pole R – ? pole M
arenite
Hubert 1960 X X X X Orthoquartzite Arkose Graywacke Pole Q Pole Q – Pole R –
Mc Bride 1963 X – – – Quartzarenite Arkose Litharenite Pole Q Pole Q ? – –
Dott 1964 X X – X Quartz arenite / wacke Feldspathic arenite Lithic arenite / wacke Pole Q Pole Q ? ? 4th pole
/ wacke
Gazzi 1966 X X – (X) (Protoquarzite) Arcose (Arenite litica) Pole Q Pole Q – – –
Folk 1968–80 X – (X) (X) Quartzarenite Arkose Litharenite Pole Q Pole R Pole R – –
Dickinson 1970 X X – – Quartzose sandstone Feldspathic Lithic sandstone Pole Q Pole Q – – –
sandstone (arkose) (graywacke)
Dickinson 1985 X X X – Quartzose sandstone Feldspathic Lithic sandstone Poles Qt & Lt Poles Qt – – –
sandstone, arkose & Lt
Zuffa 1980–85 X – – – Quartzarenite Arkose Litharenite Pole Q pole L Pole L – –
This one 2019 X – – – Quartzose sand/stone Feldspathic sand/ Lithic sand/stone Pole Q pole L Pole L – –
sandstone
Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563
E. Garzanti
“clay matrix” was chosen as an end-member of sandstone composition
in most formal classification schemes proposed in the 1950s (e.g.,
Pettijohn, 1949; Dapples et al., 1953; Gilbert, 1954; Packham, 1954;
Bokman, 1955; Crook, 1960). Later on, several authors emphasized the
rarity of modern sand characterized by very poor sorting (Cummins,
1962; Whetten, 1969), and concluded that the supposedly peculiar
aspect of greywackes was not original, but produced during diagenesis
by a variety of processes including plastic deformation of altered vol-
canic rock fragments or other soft clasts of either extrabasinal or in-
trabasinal origin to create what has been termed pseudomatrix
(Dickinson, 1970; Whetten and Hawkins, 1970; Galloway, 1974). The
“greywacke problem” was solved.
4.1. Why greywackes should be forgotten
The term greywacke (grauwacke in German, graywacke in American
English) was formally introduced in 1785 by mine director F.W.H. von
Trebra, adopted by A.G. Werner (1787 p.18) and defined as “quartz
breccias with flakes of micas and fragments of chert or sandstones in a ce-
ment of clay” (Lasius, 1789). The type greywackes are upper Paleozoic
deep-water sandstones of the Hartz mountains that contain quartz as
well as abundant feldspar and diverse plutonic, volcanic, metamorphic,
and sedimentary rock fragments (Helmbold and van Houten, 1958;
Huckenholz, 1963). The term has generated confusion and has been
harshly criticized since its early introduction (Mawe, 1818 p.92;
Sedgwick and Murchison, 1839 p.260; Murchison, 1854 p.359;
Krynine, 1956; Boswell, 1960; Okada, 1971), until Folk (1968) p.128)
conclusively pointed out that greywacke is nothing else than “a very
hard, ugly, dirty, dark rock that you can't tell much about in the field”.
4.2. Why arkoses should be forgotten
The term arkose was introduced by Brongniart (1826) and originally
defined as sandstone containing either more quartz than feldspar (ar-
kose commune) or more feldspar than quartz (arkose granitoide). The
type arkose derived from the Massif Central in France, however, may
contain a variety of igneous (granite), sedimentary (sandstone), and
metamorphic (quartzite) rock fragments, largely overlapping the type
greywacke in both texture and composition (Huckenholz, 1963; Dott,
1964 p.626; Dickinson, 1970 p.697). As for greywacke, sub-greywacke,
high-rank greywacke and low-rank greywacke, the compositions of
arkose (or “arkosite”), impure arkose, arkosic arenite, arkosic wacke, or
subarkose have been defined through time with inconsistent boundaries
(Figs. 1, 2; Oriel, 1949; Scholle, 1979). Consequently, arkose and sub-
arkose are at best imprecise synonyms of generally but not necessarily
lithic-poor, feldspar-rich and feldspar-bearing sandstones. As R.H. Dott
(1964 p.625) put it: “the name arkose itself has little descriptive merit;
feldspathic sandstone would seem far more useful”.
5. Petrographic classification of sand and sandstone
Terrigenous sediments are random assemblages of monomineralic
and polymineralic particles derived from any type of source rock, gar-
bage cans that potentially host any kind of extrabasinal and in-
trabasinal, larger and smaller, platy and equant, low-density and high-
density, carbonate and non‑carbonate, felsic and mafic silicate grains.
Making order is necessary.
By the simple procedure presented here, a composite descriptive
label is attached to sand or sandstone samples based on their petro-
graphic composition (Fig. 3). Because communicative efficiency makes
a scientific article or technical report shorter and clearer, the aim is to
transmit the richest information with the fewest words. If not widely
agreed upon and adopted, however, a new terminology only introduces
unwanted noise. Taking advantage of already existing methods and
familiar terms, provided they are appropriate, is sensible, economic,
and may facilitate acceptance by the community. For this reason, the
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Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563
proposed classification: a) is based on a consolidated analytical tech-
nique (i.e., Gazzi-Dickinson method; Ingersoll et al., 1984; Zuffa, 1985);
b) makes use of fundamental parameters and of a universally re-
cognized graphical display (i.e., QFL plot); c) is expressed by readily
understood compositional terms that follow a straightforward scheme
proposed and endorsed by authoritative researchers since the 1960s.
5.1. The Gazzi-Dickinson method
Gazzi (1966 p.73–74) started from the obvious consideration that
coarse-grained rock fragments inevitably tend to be more abundant in
coarser-grained samples. Therefore, in order to obtain comparable
quantitative data from samples of different grain size, he proposed that
minerals occurring within rock fragments and exceeding 30 μm in size –
the conventional boundary between frictional grains and cohesive
matrix as well as the thickness of a standard thin section (Spencer,
1963; Dott, 1964 p.630–631) – should be reunited in the dataset with
single detrital minerals of the same type.
A similar, albeit simplified version of this operational procedure was
proposed independently a few years later by Dickinson (1970), who
distinguished formally between aphanite lithic fragments (L) to be
counted as such, and microphanerite rock fragments (R) to be assigned
according to the mineral beneath the cross-hair. The boundary between
fine-grained aphanites and coarse-grained phanerites was chosen in-
stead as 62.5 μm (i.e., the lower limit of the sand range), as agreed by P.
Gazzi's former student G.G. Zuffa (1980 p.27, 1985). As a partial so-
lution to this problem in case of data collection with the traditional QFR
method, in which rock fragments are counted as such, (Suttner et al.,
1981), Folk (1980 p.127) proposed to group coarse-grained granitoid
and granitoid-gneiss grains with feldspar in pole F, and to assign only
fine-grained volcanic, metamorphic, and sedimentary rock fragments to
pole R (Fig. 1).
The Gazzi-Dickinson method was eventually formalized by Ingersoll
et al. (1984) and successively widely accepted by most sandstone pet-
rographers under the belief that “use of the method minimizes variation of
composition with grain size, thus eliminating the need for sieving and mul-
tiple counts of different size fractions”, which is overly optimistic
(Garzanti et al., 2006a p.331). The rectified statement found a dozen
lines below in Ingersoll et al. (1984 p.103) reads: “there are two reasons
for variation of modal composition with grain size: 1) the breakage of
fragments into constituent grains, and 2) actual mineralogic variation with
grain size. The Gazzi-Dickinson method successfully eliminates the first
source of compositional grain-size dependency. No point-counting method
eliminates the second source.”
5.2. The QFL triangle
A consensus has long been reached among sedimentary petro-
graphers that, as a first approximation, sand and sandstone can be
considered as ternary mixtures of three principal components: quartz
(Q; most common mineral species in the Earth's crust), feldspars (F;
most common mineral group in the Earth's crust), and monomineralic
or polymineralic rock or lithic fragments (R or L, respectively). Other
components are generally less abundant, considered as accessories, and
neglected for classification purposes not only to reduce complexity but
also to come closer to a transport-invariant measure of sediment com-
position (Weltje, 2004). Most accessories have peculiar hydraulic be-
haviour because of their distinct shapes (e.g., slow-settling platy phyl-
losilicates) or densities (e.g., fast-settling dense minerals), and can be
strongly concentrated or depleted locally in sedimentary deposits, thus
primarily reflecting physical processes in depositional environments
(Garzanti et al., 2008, 2009). Intrabasinal grains, which in sediment
samples may be mixed in any proportion with terrigenous extrabasinal
detritus derived from erosion of source rocks, must be considered in-
dependently for classification purposes (Fig. 3 in Zuffa, 1980; Fig. 1 in
Garzanti, 1991).
E. Garzanti
Once major framework components are reduced to three, sand and
sandstone can be readily classified making use of the classical QFL
triangular diagram, in which each point represents a ternary composi-
tion obtained by the Gazzi-Dickinson point-counting method. A most
precise way to convey compositional information would be represented
by the relative numerical proportions among the three major compo-
nents (e.g., with a format like Q45F18L37; Dickinson, 1970). Although
appropriate for tabulated data, however, an analytical script such as
this singles out each object of the suite, and a classification of singles is
no classification at all.
5.3. Nomenclature
Most traditional classifications of sand and sandstone are based on
the quartz-feldspar-lithics (QFL) or quartz-feldspar-rock fragments
(QFR) triangle, subdivided into several fields (generally 5 to 10), each
labelled differently and delimited by necessarily arbitrary conventional
boundaries (Figs. 1, 2). The first step of the procedure proposed here is
the same as in Weltje (2006 p.82): by tracing “three lines from each of the
vertices towards the middle of the opposite sides, i.e. lines along which the
abundance of one component equals that of another” the QFL space is
subdivided in 6 equal right-angled triangles labelled as litho-felds-
pathic, feldspatho-lithic, quartzo-lithic, litho-quartzose, feldspatho-
quartzose, and quartzo-feldspathic (Fig. 3B). The adjectives feldspathic
(F/L > 3), litho-feldspathic (3 > F/L > 1), feldspatho-lithic (3 > L/
F > 1) and lithic (L/F > 3) were originally proposed by Crook (1960
p.425), and considered by Dickinson (1970 p.697) to “permit adequate
discrimination without confusion”.
G.J. Weltje's straightforward classification, however, considers only
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Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563
Fig. 3. The proposed classification of sand and sandstone. A)
Straightforward subdivision into quartzose, feldspathic, and
lithic compositions by considering the most abundant QFL
component only. B) In the scheme of Weltje (2006), 6 fields
are obtained by considering the relative abundance of the two
most abundant QFL components. C) In the expanded scheme
of Garzanti (2016), 15 fields are obtained by considering all
three QFL components provided they exceed 10%QFL. D) The
refined classification of feldspatho-quartzose and quartzose
sand and sandstone (Garzanti et al., 2018a) leads to 18 fields
overall. Q = quartzose (qQ = pure quartzose); F = felds-
pathic; L = lithic; FQ = feldspatho-quartzose (fFQ = feld-
spar-rich; qFQ = quartz-rich); QF = quartzo-feldspathic;
LF = litho-feldspathic; FL = feldspatho-lithic; QL = quartzo-
lithic; LQ = litho-quartzose; lFQ = litho-feldspatho-quart-
zose; lQF = litho-quartzo-feldspathic; qLF = quartzo-litho-
feldspathic; qFL = quartzo-feldspatho-lithic; fQL = feld-
spatho-quartzo-lithic; fLQ = feldspatho-litho-quartzose.
the ratio between two of the three major components, and conveys no
information on the abundance of the third. Moreover, very different
compositions (e.g., Q99F1L0 and Q35F33L32) would plot in the same
field. Additional fields are needed to increase classification efficiency
and discrimination power. A simple effective way is to trace another
three lines corresponding to a 10% relative content of each major
component, thus obtaining another 9 fields (15 overall; Fig. 3C). The six
central fields, where all three major components exceed 10%, are equal
right-angled triangles labelled as quartzo-litho-feldspathic (qLF),
quartzo-feldspatho-lithic (qFL), feldspatho-quartzo-lithic (fQL), feld-
spatho-litho-quartzose (fLQ), litho-feldspatho-quartzose (lFQ), and
litho-quartzo-feldspathic (lQF). The six trapezoidal fields along the
three legs of the QFL triangle, where one major component does not
exceed 10%, are labelled as litho-feldspathic (LF), feldspatho-lithic
(FL), quartzo-lithic (QL), litho-quartzose (LQ), feldspatho-quartzose
(FQ), and quartzo-feldspathic (QF). The three rhomboidal fields at the
apices, where two out of the three major components do not exceed
10%, are thus simply labelled lithic (L), feldspathic (F), and quartzose
(Q). The rationale here is that a component below 10% can be ignored
for nomenclatural purposes.
These 15 fields are sufficiently narrow to be meaningful and at the
same time sufficiently wide to allow samples to be classified by a
careful inspection under the microscope, even without the need of full
quantitative analysis. Difficulties may arise for samples in which quartz,
feldspar, and lithic fragments are all present in subequal proportions
(i.e., ≥ 30%QFL), in which case a Q ≈ F ≈ L field may be informally
considered. Observations of sand and sandstone specimens with a hand
lens can hardly be accurate enough to apply this classification in the
field, where more generic terms such as quartzose, feldspar-bearing,
E. Garzanti
lithic-bearing, feldspar-rich, or lithic-rich may be used.
In conformity with the original use by Crook (1960) and Dickinson
(1970, 1985), and differently from Weltje (2006), the prevalent com-
ponent goes last, so that a litho-feldspatho-quartzose sand has more
quartz than feldspar, and more feldspar than lithics. The main draw-
back with this nomenclature is a certain awkwardness of lengthy labels
such as litho-feldspatho-quartzose but, on the other hand, these com-
posite names add to the precision of petrographic descriptions and are
immediately intelligible in terms of relative composition. This eco-
nomic scheme does not require the introduction of new fancy names
and gets rid of the use of reference standards to define the composition
of rocks (e.g., type greywacke or type arkose; Huckenholz, 1963), an
“archetype” doctrine already superseded in many fields of the geos-
ciences, from igneous petrology to stratigraphy (Dott, 1964 p.626;
Ager, 1981 ch.7).
6. Lithic-rich and lithic-poor sand and sandstone
When detrital components in sand or sandstone samples are highly
diverse and potentially so numerous, can a classification based on three
main framework components only be satisfactorily complete? The an-
swer to this rhetorical question is that two further specifications are
needed to make the classification system sufficiently informative. For
lithic-rich sand and sandstone we may designate the dominant group
(e.g., volcanic, plutonic, metamorphic, or sedimentary) and possibly
specific type (e.g., felsic or mafic, low-grade or high-grade, gneiss or
sepentineschist, limestone or chert) of rock fragments, which are the
carriers of most robust provenance information. For lithic-poor sand
and sandstone, instead, we may specify the relative abundance of
quartz and feldspar, and possibly the dominant feldspar type as well
(i.e., K or Fk = K-feldspar vs. P or Fp = plagioclase). Adding in-
dependent textural information is also useful, because the relative
abundance of quartz, feldspar, and lithic fragments may be markedly
influenced by sample grain size.
6.1. The classification of lithic-poor sand and sandstone
If lithic fragments are few, then it is essential to retrieve and in-
corporate in the classificatory label what quartz and feldspars may re-
veal. Anorogenic sediments deposited along passive margins and fed by
rivers draining continental interiors typically consist of quartz and
feldspar mostly (continental block provenance of Dickinson, 1985;
Sciunnach and Garzanti, 2012). In such cases, key information is pro-
vided by the Q/F ratio, traditionally considered as controlled by the
competition between chemical weathering and unroofing rate in source
areas. Feldspar prevails where granitoid basement is unroofed either
very rapidly (tectonic arkose of Folk, 1980; basement uplift sub-pro-
venance of Dickinson, 1985) or in arid climate (climatic arkose of Folk,
1980), whereas quartz dominates in case of intense weathering or ex-
tensive recycling of older quartz-rich sandstone in low-relief shield
areas during long periods of tectonic quiescence (craton interior sub-
provenance of Dickinson, 1985).
The necessity to formally distinguish between sand and sandstone
with Q/F < 1 and typically P > K (ideal arkose of Dickinson, 1985)
from those with Q/F > 1 and commonly P < K (plagioclase being
widely considered more weatherable than alkali feldspar; Goldich,
1938; Velbel, 1993) has been felt since Brongniart (1826) formally
distinguished between arkose granitoide (Q/F < 1) and arkose commune
(Q/F > 1). Different definitions contemplating diverse conventional
boundaries have been proposed since then. In the classification of Folk
(1980 p.127), an arkose contains < 75% quartz and > 18.75% feldspar
(Q/F < 4), a subarkose from 75% to 95% quartz and from 2.5% to
25% feldspar (3 < Q/F < 38), and a quartzarenite > 95% quartz (Q/
F > 19).
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Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563
The scheme proposed here to classify lithic-poor sand and sand-
stone, particularly fruitful in the study of modern passive-margin sand
generated in the subequatorial climatic belt (Garzanti et al., 2018a), is
based on the Q/F ratio and allows identification of diverse categories
required to convey useful compositional information. Distinguished
within the feldspatho-quartzose class are a feldspar-rich subclass (fFQ;
1 < Q/F < 2), which may be differentiated further into plagioclase-
rich if P/K > 2 (pFQ) or K-feldspar-rich if K/P > 2 (kFQ), and a quartz-
rich subclass (qFQ; 4 < Q/F < 9). Distinguished within the quartzose
class is a pure quartzose subclass (qQ; Q%QFL > 95), corresponding to
the quartzarenite of Folk (1980). The complete classification scheme
including these refined subdivisions consists of 18 compositional fields
overall (Fig. 3D), allowing us to capture in one composite name the
essential petrographic features of sand and sandstone.
6.2. The description of lithic-rich sand and sandstone
The description of lithic-rich samples poses the opposite problem:
an excess of information that can be hardly compressed in the classi-
ficatory label. The challenge was tackled by Folk (1968), who increased
the informative value of his classification by adding auxiliary triangles
to the main QFR diagram (Fig. 1). His MRF-VRF-SRF ternary plot for-
mally distinguishes among lithic-rich sandstones containing mainly
metamorphic, volcanic, or sedimentary rock fragments – formally
named phyllarenite, volcanic arenite, and sedarenite – and next among
sedarenites containing mainly carbonate, chert, or terrigenous rock
fragments – named calclithite, chert-arenite, and shale-arenite or
sandstone-arenite –. Ingersoll and Suczek (1979) introduced the
LmLvLs ternary plot, the Gazzi-Dickinson version of Folk's MRF-VRF-
SRF diagram. Ternary diagrams, however, work badly wherever detrital
components cannot be reduced to three groups sharply, and MRF-VRF-
SRF or LmLvLs plots suffer from at least two major problems. First, the
boundary between sedimentary and metasedimentary grains, as well as
between volcanic and metavolcanic grains, is difficult to define in order
to obtain consistent results by different operators (Wolf, 1971;
Dickinson, 1985 p.338). Progressively more detailed operational solu-
tions have been suggested in subsequent years (Fig. 4 in Dorsey, 1988;
Fig. 7 in White et al., 2002; Figs. 1 to 4 in Garzanti and Vezzoli, 2003),
but the problem remains, for instance, in the distinction between
sparitic limestone or dolostone versus marble grains. Secondly, grains
that carry major provenance information such as ultramafic or fine-
grained plutonic clasts (e.g., granophyre) are not unequivocally as-
signed. All igneous grains may be grouped within pole Lv, perhaps in-
cluding cellular serpentinite (Fig. 4O), whereas foliated serpentines-
chist (Fig. 4P) may join pole Lm with undetermined ultramafic grains
split 50–50%. Other operational choices, including how to consider
chert and carbonate grains, are tackled in section 7, but the main point
here is that the spectrum of rock fragments is so wide that any attempt
to handle them with a rigid procedure is doomed to failure in complex
natural cases. A flexible scheme is thus required.
As a simple way to indicate prevalent types of rock fragments (re-
ference to rock fragments rather than to lithics is preferred here to
maximize provenance information), the adjectives plutoniclastic, me-
tamorphiclastic, or sedimentaclastic can be added to the classificatory
label in analogy to the widely used volcaniclastic. These terms, in-
troduced by Ingersoll (1983 p.1137), were originally meant to be “ge-
netic and interpretive, as opposed to descriptive”. However, in conformity
with the leitmotif of this article expressed in section 2, these adjectives
may be better used to inform objectively about the dominant rock-
fragment type in the sample without any subjective genetic implication.
Also more specific adjectives such as carbonaticlastic, cherticlastic,
basalticlastic, gneissiclastic, or ultramaficlastic may be used to this
goal.
For purely volcaniclastic sediments or sedimentary rocks, names
E. Garzanti
such as rhyodacitic and andesitic sand (Dickinson, 1985) or rhyolite-
arenite and andesite-arenite (Folk, 1980 p.128) have been proposed. In
a similar way, the diverse end-member compositions displayed by
modern sand derived from monolithologic sources within distinct tec-
tono-stratigraphic levels of a lithospheric section (first-order sampling
scale of Ingersoll et al., 1993) were designated as metarhyodacite sand,
slate sand, phyllite sand, schist sand, gneiss sand, kinzigite sand, stro-
nalite sand, granite sand, gabbro sand, and peridotite sand (Garzanti
et al., 2006b). In the general situation of polylithologic sources and
mixed rock-fragment types, none of which dominant, terms such as
chert-bearing or serpentineschist-bearing may be used to highlight the
presence of a particularly significant component. The guideline of this
articulated free scheme is to borrow previously proposed criteria and
terms to devise a coherent procedure by which every sample of sand or
sandstone can be given its proper name.
7. Rock fragments: the goldmine of provenance information
Whereas single minerals may derive from diverse rock types, the
texture and mineralogy of rock fragments generally point uniquely to a
specific lithology (Fig. 4). Such information is invaluable in provenance
analysis and must not be lost during data collection when using the
Gazzi-Dickinson point-counting method (Gazzi and Zuffa, 1970; Suttner
and Basu, 1985). As recommended by Gazzi (1966), this can be done
either by using a detailed point-counting sheet that allows the si-
multaneous registration of the mineral beneath the cross-hair and of the
rock fragment in which the mineral is located (Fig. 5; Table 1 in Zuffa,
1980; Table 3 in Zuffa, 1985; Table 2 in Fontana et al., 1985), or by
dedicating a second count specifically to rock-fragment types (Ingersoll
and Suczek, 1979 p.1220; Zuffa, 1987 p.52).
7.1. Classification of rock fragments
The effort to discriminate in great detail among the vast spectrum of
rock fragments potentially encountered in sand and sandstone (Fig. 4)
in order to retain the maximum possible level of information may lead
to an unacceptable degree of inhomogeneity in datasets. A robust
classification of rock fragments is thus necessary to ensure compar-
ability among results obtained by different operators.
To this goal, Dickinson (1970 p.700–701) proposed an operational
classification of aphanite to microgranular lithic grains complemented
with textural criteria apt to discriminate consistently among sedimen-
tary (silty-sandy, argillaceous), volcanic or subvolcanic (vitric, felsitic,
microlitic, lathwork, hypabyssal, volcaniclastic), and metamorphic
types (metasedimentary, metavolcanic, hornfelsic). Building on
Graham et al. (1976), Ingersoll and Suczek (1979 p.1220–1221) in-
troduced additional categories for metamorphic lithics based on their
mineralogy and texture (i.e., polycrystalline mica, quartz-mica tecto-
nite, quartz-mica aggregate, quartz-mica-feldspar aggregate). Dorsey
(1988) subdivided metasedimentary lithics by paying specific attention
to their metamorphic rank into Lm1 (slate, quartzite, slatey siltstone)
and Lm2 categories (phyllite-schist, phyllitic quartzite, quartz-mica-al-
bite-aggregate), and included chert within sedimentary grains. As a
further refinement, White et al. (2002) classified metasedimentary
lithics according to both protolith (pelitic vs. felsitic) and rank
(Lm1 = slate, metasandstone; Lm2 = phyllite; Lm3 = micaschist,
gneiss). Garzanti et al. (2002a) emphasized the importance of ultra-
mafic detritus, formally distinguishing between cellular lizardite-ser-
pentinite and foliated antigorite-serpentineschist grains (Fig. 4 O,P).
Garzanti and Vezzoli (2003) proposed a comprehensive operational
classification scheme, illustrated by 24 prototypical grains, that con-
siders four protolith compositions (pelitic, psammitic or felsic volcanic,
carbonatic, mafic volcanic) and six successive degrees of increasing
metamorphic recrystallization from none to medium-high grade.
Overall, a suite of a hundred rock-fragment types and subtypes in-
cluding sophisticated categories such as “amphibole-bearing quartz-
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Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563
feldspar gneiss of rank 4” can be used consistently during routine point-
counting by the Gazzi-Dickinson method (Fig. 5).
This does not mean that identification of rock fragments under the
microscope is easy, especially in strongly diagenetically-altered sand-
stone samples, where even grain boundaries are hard to establish. Long-
standing problems include difficulties in distinguishing felsitic volcanic
rock fragments from impure unfossiliferous chert (Wolf, 1971), correct
identification of pseudomatrix as groundmass generated by the altera-
tion and deformation of lithic grains (Dickinson, 1970), and the trou-
blesome distinction between terrigenous extrabasinal versus in-
trabasinal carbonate and non‑carbonate grains (Zuffa, 1980, 1985;
Garzanti, 1991). An analogous thorny issue, represented by the differ-
entiation of neovolcanic versus paleovolcanic detritus (i.e., grains ori-
ginated from erosion of penecontemporaneous vs. notably older vol-
canic rocks; Zuffa, 1980; Critelli and Ingersoll, 1995), does not generate
problems in the classification of sand and sandstone because coeval and
non-coeval volcanic lithics are all assigned to pole L. This distinction,
based on criteria described in Zuffa (1985, 1987), is nevertheless cri-
tical for a correct provenance diagnosis.
There is no general consensus on how these problems should be
treated operationally, whether we should surrender to challenging
grain identifications or not, and whether lithic grains should be
grouped by their origin or by their presumed stability. Idealized con-
cepts such as “stability” or “maturity” are highly questionable
(Garzanti, 2017), because grains may be durable in certain environ-
ments but labile in others. Most detrital minerals including olivine and
pyroxene can resist sediment transport over thousands of kilometers in
high-energy fluvial, eolian, and marine environments (Garzanti et al.,
2015a, 2015b), whereas none, including quartz and zircon, can be
considered exempt from chemical vulnerability in hyperhumid equa-
torial climates or during diagenesis (Crook, 1968; Cleary and Conolly,
1972; Garzanti et al., 2013a, 2018b). Clarity and objectiveness, which
are the essential requirements of a classification, are lost when sub-
jective assumptions are made concerning the relative durability of grain
types independently of specific processes and physico-chemical condi-
tions encountered during erosion, transport, deposition, and burial.
7.2. Chert and polycrystalline quartz
By giving privilege to stability, Gazzi (1966 p.74) and next
Dickinson (1970 p.696) chose to group in pole Q “the sum of quartz and
chalcedony grains of all kinds“. Following Krynine (1948), initially also
Folk (1954) decided to assign chert to pole Q, but next changed his
mind in favour of pole R (Folk, 1980 p.127), as in van Andel (1958),
Füchtbauer (1959), Chen (1968), and Okada (1971) (Table 1). As a
conciliatory solution, Dickinson and Suczek (1979) included both
polycrystalline quartz and chert in sub-pole Qp, grouped with mono-
crystalline quartz in the QtFL plot, and with lithics in the QmFLt plot
(Fig. 1). Recurrence to these two different versions of the QFL diagram
is not straightforward and, because of different field boundaries, may
make a classification equivocal. Considering that the monocrystalline/
polycrystalline quartz ratio is highly dependent on grain size and/or on
the convention adopted during point-counting, that chert and felsic
volcanic rock fragments are not invariably distinguishable, and that
gradation from pure chert to argillite is also common (Folk, 1980 p.126;
Dickinson, 1985 p.336–337), the easiest and most reasonable escape
from the tangle is to group all chert grains to pole L (Zuffa, 1980;
Dorsey, 1988) and all quartz grains to pole Q (Fontana et al., 1985).
This simple procedure allows using a single QFL diagram for classifi-
cation with great gain in simplicity and clarity.
7.3. Carbonate and evaporite grains
Difficulties in identifying the intrabasinal versus extrabasinal origin
of carbonate grains, and of sedimentary grains in general, have long
been acknowledged (e.g., Gazzi, 1966 p.76). Zuffa (1980, 1985)
E. Garzanti Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563

Fig. 4. Rock fragments: the goldmine of provenance information. Sedimentary grains: A, B) carbonaticlastic sand (Wadi Bih, northern Oman); C) gypsum sand (Azraq
dune field, Jordan); D) chert sand (Romandato creek, southern Italy); E) clast reworked from Oligocene turbidites (Galathea River, Great Nicobar Island).
Metasedimentary grains: F) slate sand (Dazhu River, Taiwan); G) calcschist from the Tauern Window (Fuschbach River, Austria); H) fibrolitic-sillimanite schist from
the Greater Himalaya (Dordi Khola, Nepal). Volcanic grains derived from: I) Deccan Trap basalts (Tapti River, India), J) andesites (Rio Grande, Argentina), and K)
rhyolites (Lipari Island, Italy). L) Metavolcanic grains from anchimetamorphic Permian rhyolites (Southern Alps, Italy). Metabasite grains: M) epidote greenschist
(Laba River, NW Greater Caucasus) and N) epidote-glaucophane blueschist (Varaita River, W European Alps). Ultramafic grains: O) cellular serpentinite from
obducted ophiolites (Wadi Ham, northern Oman); P) foliated serpentineschist from subducted metaophiolites (Voltri beach, Italy). All photos taken with crossed
polars; blue bar for scale = 100 μm.

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E. Garzanti Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563

(caption on next page)

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E. Garzanti Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563

Fig. 5. Point-counting sheet used routinely for petrographic analysis of modern sand at the Laboratory of Provenance Studies (Milano-Bicocca University). This
scheme allows us to record full detailed information on rock-fragment types and to recalculate petrographic parameters according to both Gazzi-Dickinson QFL and
traditional QFR methods.

provided detailed operational criteria to discriminate intraclasts, bio-
clasts, ooids, or peloids generated within the sedimentary basin and
coeval with deposition versus limestone or dolostone rock fragments
derived from erosion of older carbonate rocks outside of the sedimen-
tary basin (Fig. 4A,B). Because such distinction is seldom straightfor-
ward, grains that cannot be recognized with certainty as intrabasinal or
extrabasinal are assigned during point-counting to a neutral “limeclast”
category (Wolf, 1965; Blatt et al., 1972 p.460; Zuffa, 1980 p.26).
Limeclasts may be next tentatively reapportioned to either the in-
trabasinal or extrabasinal group, in the worst case by a 50–50% split to
minimize error.
The problem is even more complicated because non-coeval in-
trabasinal grains exist as well, such as those reworked locally from
previously deposited layers affected by early cementation or pedogen-
esis (e.g., beach rock, eolianites, caliche), or eroded from underlying
depositional sequences during episodes of tectonic uplift or eustatic
lowstand (e.g., Garzanti et al., 2003, 2017b). Such complexities may
regard a wide variety of grains, including clay chips, gypsum, glaucony,
chert, or phosphate clasts reworked from mudcracks, soil profiles,
sabkhas, or marine hardgrounds (Garzanti, 1991). In sandstones, crys-
talline carbonate or evaporite rock fragments may be misidentified as
authigenic cement (Henares et al., 2014), an occurrence of “pseudo-
cement” that represents a specular case to the occurrence of pseudo-
matrix.
Problems can be tackled, running the risk of making errors, or
skipped. On the one side, Mack (1984 p.218) concluded that “carbonate
rock fragments provide important information about source rock and prob-
ably should be included in detrital modes”. On the other side, Dickinson
(1985 p.336) chose not to recalculate extrabasinal carbonate grains
with other lithic fragments “because of their vastly different geochemical
response during weathering and diagenesis, as well as the ease of confusion
with intrabasinal carbonate grains”. Using durability as a criterion for
discriminating certain grain types, however, spoils any attempt to de-
sign a descriptive classification by introducing an unacceptable degree
of subjectivity. Carbonate grains prove to be resistant in a vast range of
climatic conditions (Gazzi et al., 1973; Zuffa, 1980; Ingersoll et al.,
1987; Garzanti et al., 2002b; Picard and McBride, 2007), but are easily
lost in humid climates in the presence of abundant water and dissolved
carbon dioxide (Schnoor and Stumm, 1986; Stumm and Morgan, 1996
p.188ff; Singh and France-Lanord, 2002). In arid climates, even gypsum
or anhydrite grains are preserved (Fig. 4C; Henares et al., 2014;
Garzanti et al., 2016 p.121). There is no objective rule to determine
whether a grain will survive the diverse physico-chemical environments
experienced during one or more sedimentary cycles, and if we are to
neglect carbonate rock fragments because they are potentially soluble,
then we should neglect as well even more mechanically or chemically
labile lithic grains such as shale or gypsum. Few sedimentary lithics will
be retained.
Petrographic analysis of sand or sandstone samples poses multiple
challenges, but they need to be faced with the conceptual and tech-
nological tools at our disposal, and hopefully won with time one by one.
Whenever we fail, problems should be exposed, otherwise they will
never be solved. All types of extrabasinal lithic fragments, in-
dependently of their presumed stability, are considered and assigned to
pole L in the proposed classification scheme.
8. Provenance and classification of modern sand
Contrasting compositions of sand derived from diverse orogenic and
anorogenic tectonic domains, and found in major river systems, deserts,
and deep-sea fans, provide a solid objective basis to establish a link
between petrographic signature and geology of source terranes. Such an
approach, widely pursued since the last century based on both QFR
(Krynine, 1948; Folk, 1968; Potter, 1978) and QFL detrital modes
(Dickinson and Suczek, 1979), showed that compositional patterns are
not random, although controlled by several factors superposed to
source-rock lithology, including physical and chemical processes during
erosion, transportation, and deposition for modern sediments (en-
vironmental bias) and burial as well for ancient sedimentary rocks
(diagenetic bias; Johnsson, 1993; Weltje, 2012; Basu, 2017). An up-
dated overview is provided in this conclusive section, which focuses on
modern sediments - where source terranes and their geodynamic,
geomorphological, and climatic settings are known and all factors af-
fecting sediment composition can be verified - and includes un-
published data collected at the Laboratory of Provenance Studies
(University of Milano-Bicocca) on river sand in North America,
northern Europe, northern Asia and Australia, and on eolian sand from
the Kalahari and Sahara sand seas.
8.1. Igneous sources
Major orogenic and anorogenic sources of igneous detritus include
magmatic arcs, ophiolitic complexes, and continental flood basalts.
Main characteristic features are the abundance of feldspar in plutoni-
clastic sand, of volcanic lithics in volcaniclastic sand, and of mafic to
ultramafic lithics in ophiolite-derived sand.
Magmatic arcs as paradigmatic sources of igneous detritus have
been thoroughly investigated by W.R. Dickinson and co-workers, who
documented how composition changes systematically through time as
the plutonic roots of the arc massif are progressively stripped off of their
volcanic cover (Dickinson, 1985; Marsaglia and Ingersoll, 1992;
Ingersoll, 2012). Undissected basaltic to andesitic volcanic provinces
shed quartz-poor sand containing mainly microlitic lithic fragments and
plagioclase, thus plotting in the FL field and less commonly in the LF
field (e.g., owing to hydraulic concentration of crystals; Dickinson,
1970 p.705). Sand derived from more felsic rhyodacitic products con-
tains quartz and largely felsitic volcanic lithics and may straddle the
qFL and fQL fields. Wherever the deep-seated batholithic roots of the
arc start to be patchily exposed, quartz and K-feldspar increase at the
expense of volcanic lithics and detrital modes may straddle the qLF,
qFL, and fQL fields. At an advanced stage of dissection, detritus will plot
in the lQF or lFQ fields and, finally, where only the plutonic arc base-
ment is exposed, in the QF or fFQ fields (Ingersoll and Eastmond, 2007;
Garzanti et al., 2018c).
Volcaniclastic detritus shed from continental flood basalts in rift-
related settings is not readily discriminated from detritus derived from
undissected magmatic arcs. Large anorogenic igneous provinces, how-
ever, are typically characterized by bimodal products. The Ethiopia-
Yemen Traps, including both basaltic flows and felsic lavas and ig-
nimbrites (Ayalew et al., 2002; Ukstins et al., 2002), shed sand strad-
dling the L, FL, qFL, and fQL fields (Garzanti et al., 2001, 2015b). The
Karoo and Etendeka Traps of southern Africa, the latter including
quartz latites at higher stratigraphic levels (Ewart et al., 2004), supply
sand plotting in the L and subordinately FL fields (Garzanti et al.,
2014). The potassic Virunga volcanoes, including silica-saturated latites
and trachytes (Rogers et al., 1998), generate sand containing very little
or no quartz and plotting in the FL and subordinately L fields (Garzanti
et al., 2013a). Sand produced in basaltic oceanic islands, including
Iceland, Cape Verde, Tahiti, and Hawaii, also plot in the FL and L fields
(Marsaglia, 1993; Dinis et al., 2019).
Because the only quartz that oceanic lithosphere contains is hosted
in plagiogranite bodies at the top of magma chambers (Dilek and

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E. Garzanti
Furnes, 2011), ophiolite-derived sand consists almost entirely of pla-
gioclase and mafic to ultramafic lithic fragments. The ideal petro-
graphic trend in case of progressive dissection of oceanic lithosphere
includes volcaniclastic detritus with dominant lathwork basaltic to vi-
tric and locally boninitic lithics derived from pillow lavas and sheeted-
dike complexes, followed by plutoniclastic detritus derived from un-
derlying plagiogranite and gabbro, and finally by ultramafic detritus
dominated by cellular serpentinite lithics derived from obducted
mantle rocks (Garzanti et al., 2000, 2002a). In the QFL triangle, such a
trend would describe a counter-clockwise loop starting from the FL field
for basalticlastic sand, moving toward the qLF or even F field for the-
oretically pure gabbro sand, and finally back to the L field for ultra-
maficlastic sand (Garzanti et al., 2013b).
8.2. Sedimentary and metamorphic sources
Major orogenic and anorogenic sources of sedimentary and meta-
morphic detritus are fold-thrust belts, subduction complexes, and
crustal sections exposed on rift shoulders or within continental blocks.
Sand composition principally depends on the tectono-stratigraphic level
exposed to erosion in the source area. This was first perceived by
Krynine (1948), who envisaged the continental crust as consisting of
sedimentary cover strata generating recycled “quartzite”, underlying
metamorphic rocks generating lithic-rich “greywacke,” and eventually
deeper-seated plutonic rocks generating feldspar-rich “arkose” (Folk,
1980, p.108).
Beside quartz, however, sedimentary rocks can shed a wide spec-
trum of lithic fragments, and detrital modes of sedimentaclastic sand
may consequently plot all along the QL leg of the QFL triangle (e.g.,
Graham et al., 1976). Depending on their mudrock/sandstone ratio,
turbiditic successions accreted within subduction complexes shed sand
plotting in the L and QL fields (e.g., Garzanti et al., 1998; Di Giulio
et al., 2003), in the QL and LQ fields, or even in the Q and qQ fields
(Garzanti et al., 2013b; Limonta et al., 2015). Wherever parent turbi-
ditic sandstones within accretionary prisms include common feldspar,
daughter sand may plot in the fQL, fLQ, or even in the lFQ field
(Cavazza et al., 1993; Garzanti et al., 2002b; Fontana et al., 2003).
At another extreme, sedimentaclastic detritus genenerated in both
orogenic and anorogenic settings may be represented by pure carbo-
naticlastic or cherticlastic‑carbonaticlastic sand plotting in the L field.
Sand consisting exclusively of limestone and dolostone grains (Fig. 4
A,B) is found in tropical to middle-latitude regions, including the Eur-
opean Alps, the Apennines, and the Middle East from the Levant rifted
margin to the Zagros Mountains, where arid or semiarid climate fa-
voured carbonate rather than siliciclastic production along Neotethyan
shores through most of the Mesozoic. In the same regions, sedimenta-
clastic sand characterized or even dominated by chert grains is derived
from pelagic strata deposited originally along distal passive margins of
southern Neotethys (e.g., Toscana-Umbria domain in the Apennines,
Mamonia complex of south Cyprus, Hawasina unit in northern Oman;
Garzanti et al., 2000, 2002a, 2002b).
Detritus generated from metasedimentary rocks changes progres-
sively in composition with progressive increase in metamorphic grade.
During unroofing of upper crustal levels, quartz increases from slate
sand derived from anchimetamorphic and epimetamorphic metapelites,
to phyllite sand derived from lower-greenschist or blueschist facies
schists and calcschists, all plotting in the QL field. Schist sand derived
from upper greenschist-facies schists, paragneisses and marbles may
reach into the fLQ field (Garzanti et al., 2010a). During unroofing of
deeper crustal levels, feldspar increases in gneiss sand derived from
amphibolite-facies granitoid gneisses and plotting in the lFQ field, in
kinzigite sand derived from upper-amphibolite-facies metasediments
and straddling the lFQ and lQF fields, and in stronalite sand derived
from lower-crustal granulite-facies metasediments associated with me-
tagabbros and straddling the lQF and qLF fields (Garzanti et al., 2006a,
2006b).
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Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563
As a peculiar case of great provenance value, detritus from mantle
rocks that have undergone eclogite-facies metamorphism during sub-
duction may consist entirely of strongly foliated antigorite-serpenti-
neschist grains plotting in the L field (Fig. 4P; Garzanti et al., 1998,
2004).
8.3. Large rivers
Transcontinental rivers drain diverse geological domains and are
thus typically characterized by mixed sediment compositions (third-
order sampling scale of Ingersoll et al., 1993). Quartz, which is both
widespread in source rocks and durable, commonly predominates.
Lithic grains vary in type and relative abundance, whereas feldspar is
generally subordinate but common in case of widespread igneous
source rocks (Fig. 6).
Large rivers draining subequatorial cratonic regions in Africa or
South America may carry sand consisting almost exclusively of mono-
crystalline quartz and thus plotting in the qQ field (Congo, Okavango,
White Nile, Paranà, Uruguay), or containing a few feldspars and plot-
ting in the Q (Niger) or even FQ fields (Zambezi). Sand of the Orinoco
River, draining also the Andean retroarc basin, includes a few sedi-
mentary and low-rank metasedimentary lithics (Q; Limonta et al.,
2015). Feldspatho-quartzose river sand is found at tropical (e.g., Lim-
popo sand, including volcanic lithics from anorogenic Karoo basalts;
fFQ), middle (Mississippi sand; FQ), and high latitudes (e.g., Glomma
sand in Norway; qFQ).
Large rivers sourced in orogenic belts in Asia, Europe, or South
America carry diverse sedimentary and metamorphic lithics, and their
sand may plot in the fLQ field (Rhein, Po, Danube, Kuban, Amazon), in
the lFQ field (Brahmaputra, Yellow River, Red River, Mekong, Salween;
Borges et al., 2008; Garzanti et al., 2010b; Nie et al., 2015), or straddle
the fLQ and lFQ fields (Indus, Ganga, Irrawaddy,Yang Tze; Garzanti
et al., 2005, Garzanti et al., 2010b, 2016; Vezzoli et al., 2016). Volcanic
lithics derived from andesitic volcanoes in the Andes and Greater
Caucasus are common in sand of the Amazon and Kuban Rivers,
whereas volcanic lithics from the anorogenic Emeishan basalts are
subordinate in Yang Tze sand. Sand of several major rivers in North
America and Russia also plot in the fLQ (Slave, Liard, Colorado) or lFQ
fields (St. Lawrence, Lena, Ural), together with bedload sand of trans-
continental rivers such as the Nile and the Orange, which drain con-
tinental blocks including vast anorogenic basaltic provinces and thus
carry notable amounts of largely mafic volcanic lithics. Nile suspended
load is instead almost purely volcaniclastic and straddles the qFL and
fQL fields, as sand of the Columbia River that drains both orogenic and
anorogenic volcanic rocks (Whetten et al., 1969).
Quartz-poor river sand plotting in the fQL field is typical of largely
undissected orogenic domains including volcanic regions, such as the
Caucasus and the Anatolian-Iranian Plateau (Terek, Rioni, Kura, Tigris,
Euphrates; Vezzoli et al., 2014; Garzanti et al., 2016). European rivers
sourced in the Alpine, Apenninic, or Pyrenean thrust belts and largely
draining sedimentary strata may carry carbonaticlastic sand plotting in
the fQL (Rhône, Tevere) or QL (Ebro) fields.
None of the considered rivers carries feldspar-dominated sand, but
feldspar-poor examples are also rare. They include the sedimentaclastic
sand of the Murray-Darling River in Australia (LQ) and of the Peel River
in Canada (QL), as well as the almost purely carbonaticlastic sand of the
Karun River draining the Zagros Mountains in Iran and of several rivers
draining the eastern European Alps (e.g., Piave, Tagliamento; Garzanti
et al., 2006b, 2016; Picard and McBride, 2007).
8.4. Deep-sea fans
The composition of deep-sea turbidites chiefly reflects that of their
main fluvial feeder system (Dickinson, 1988; Zuffa et al., 2000). Sand in
the huge Indus and Bengal-Nicobar Fans, supplied from the Himalayas
throughout the Neogene, plots in the lFQ field (Ingersoll and Suczek,
E. Garzanti Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563

Fig. 6. Sand composition and classification in the world's largest rivers (mostly own published and unpublished data). Quartz and sedimentary lithics are generally
predominant and feldspar subordinate (Q/F never < 1), indicating that in most fluvial systems a large part of the sediment load is recycled from sedimentary strata.
Pure quartzose sand characterizes rivers draining continental blocks at subequatorial latitudes, where both weathering and recycling are extensive (White Nile,
Congo, Okavango). Lithic-rich sand characterizes rivers draining extensive sedimentary and volcanic covers in undissected orogenic domains (Euphrates, Tigris,
Terek, Kura, Rhône, Ebro, Tevere). Volcanic lithics are predominant in rivers draining orogenic andesitic arcs (Amazon), anorogenic basaltic fields (Nile, Orange,
Limpopo), or both (Columbia; Whetten et al., 1969). Metamorphic lithics are predominant in rivers draining either very active orogens (e.g., Brahmaputra) or
quiescent continental shields (e.g., Glomma). Smaller symbols refer to suspended load and exemplify two opposite cases: composition is quite similar to bedload in
the Irrawaddy River, but markedly different in the Nile River. Q = quartz; F = feldspar; L = lithics (Lm = metamorphic; Lv = volcanic; Ls = sedimentary).

Fig. 7. Sand composition and classification in deep-sea fans. Trench, forearc and back-arc turbidites all around the Pacific Ocean are chiefly fed from erosion of island
arcs in the west and continental arcs in the east. Relative abundance of volcanic lithics, feldspar, and quartz depends on character of magmatism and degree of
dissection of source terranes (Dickinson, 1985). Remnant-ocean turbidites shed from the Himalayan orogen are rich in quartz and metamorphic or sedimentary
lithics. Deep-sea fans supplied from transcontinental rivers draining continental blocks are quartz-rich (e.g., Congo Fan) but may include feldspar and volcanic lithics
derived from continental-flood basalts (e.g., Nile Cone). Each point is the mean sand composition from the upper part of one deep-sea core. Fields for magmatic-arc
provenance are based on data compilations in Marsaglia and Ingersoll (1992), Ingersoll and Eastmond (2007), and Garzanti et al. (2018c). Data sources:
BL = Bachman and Leggett (1982); Bl = Baltuck et al. (1985); Br = Bartolini et al. (1975); D = De Rosa et al. (1986); GI = Gergen and Ingersoll (1986);
G = Garzanti et al. (2018b) and own data; IS = Ingersoll and Suczek (1979); M = Marsaglia (2004); Marsaglia et al. (1992, 1995); PH = Prasad and Hesse (1982);
PI = Packer and Ingersoll (1986); S = Stewart (1977, 1978); SI = Suczek and Ingersoll (1985); YM = Yerino and Maynard (1984). Q = quartz; F = feldspar;
L = lithics (Lm = metamorphic; Lv = volcanic; Ls = sedimentary).

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E. Garzanti Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563

Fig. 8. Sand composition and classification in the world's largest deserts. Quartz is predominant in the Sahara, Kalahari, and Great Nafud sand seas nourished by
extensive recycling of older quartz-rich sandstones. Limestone lithics may be common in the Rub’ al Khali and other Arabian deserts and also occur in dunes of Egypt
and Sinai. Basaltic lithics and plagioclase characterize dune fields along the hyperarid coast of Namibia and Angola mostly fed by the Orange River. Sedimentary and
metasedimentary lithics are common in central Asia dune fields, largely supplied by major rivers draining orogenic belts (Amu Darya, Yarkhand, Yellow River).
Q = quartz; F = feldspar; L = lithics (Lm = metamorphic; Lv = volcanic; Ls = sedimentary).

1979; Suczek and Ingersoll, 1985; Pickering et al., 2018; Andò et al.,
2019). Litho-quartzose metamorphiclastic turbidites characterize the
Hellenic Trench (Bartolini et al., 1975), and quartzose to litho-quart-
zose and more rarely feldspatho-litho-quartzose compositions char-
acterize Orinoco-derived turbiditic sandstones exposed on Barbados
island (Velbel, 1985; Limonta et al., 2015). Trench, forearc, and back-
arc turbidites all around the Pacific Ocean are chiefly fed from erosion
of magmatic arcs in various stages of dissection (Fig. 7; Dickinson,
1982; Thornburg and Kulm, 1987). Deep-sea sand derived from un-
dissected island arcs or continental arcs mostly consists of volcanic
lithics and plagioclase, and thus plots in the FL field or occasionally in
the LF field. Increasing degrees of dissection are indicated by pro-
gressive increase in quartz, K-feldspar, sedimentary or metamorphic
lithics, until only quartz, feldspars, and lithic grains from metamorphic
wallrocks are found where granitoid batholiths are stripped off of their
volcanic and sedimentary cover strata (Marsaglia and Ingersoll, 1992).
Sand thus plots in the qFL field or in the adjacent fQL and qLF fields in
the transitional stage (e.g., Yerino and Maynard, 1984; De Rosa et al.,
1986; Marsaglia et al., 1995; Heberer et al., 2010), and straddle the lQF
and lFQ fields or even the QF and fFQ fields when the arc basement
becomes the dominant or exclusive source (Bachman and Leggett,
1982).

559
E. Garzanti
Quaternary sand in deep-sea fans fed by transcontinental rivers
draining anorogenic continental domains largely consists of quartz and
feldspar. Congo Fan sand is quartzose, whereas Nile Cone sand plots in
the qFQ field and contains volcanic lithics derived from the Ethiopian
continental flood basalts (Bartolini et al., 1975; Garzanti et al., 2018b).
8.5. Deserts
Dune fields occupy wide areas in arid tropical and subtropical re-
gions. Quartz is commonly dominant because of its mechanical and
chemical durability (Muhs, 2004), and eolian sand plots mostly in the
qQ field where it is largely recycled from older quartzose sandstone, as
in the Kalahari Desert of southern Africa or in the Nafud and Dahna
Deserts of Arabia (Fig. 8; Garzanti et al., 2013c, 2014). For the same
reason, quartz is dominant across the Sahara, although dunes in the
Western Desert of Egypt and in Sinai may contain feldspar and mainly
carbonate rock fragments closer to exposed Mesozoic and Cenozoic
carbonates, thus plotting in the qFQ or lFQ fields. Sand accumulated in
coastal deserts along the hyperarid Atlantic coast of southwestern
Africa, all largely fed from the Orange River, includes significant ba-
saltic detritus and plots in the FQ or lFQ fields. Sand seas of central
Asia, such as the Taklamakan and Karakum, largely fed by the Yark-
hand and Amu Darya fluvial systems, commonly include carbonate and
other sedimentary or metasedimentary lithics and may plot in the fQL,
fLQ, or lFQ fields (Rittner et al., 2016; Garzanti et al., 2019).
9. Conclusions
“The perfect classification of sandstones does not now and never will
exist” (Folk, 1980, p.126). Indeed, the information contained in a sand
or sandstone sample is so rich that it could never be compressed in a
short classificatory label. Nature is never trivially repetitive, and the
interplay of physical and chemical processes that generate sand pro-
duces an endless suite of products that cannot be captured in a finite set
of standard cages. Most classifications proposed in the past have re-
vealed the ambiguities inevitably implied in the hopeless attempt to
encapsulate in one or two words - and worse when referring to vaguely
defined archetypes such as greywacke or arkose - a range of different
properties, including mineralogy and texture as well as hydraulic be-
haviour, and the presumed durability of detrital grains to mechanical or
chemical attack during one or more sedimentary cycles. This illusion
has generated a conceptual tangle that needs to be unraveled.
This paper reviews the somewhat intricate problems involved in the
classification of sand and sandstone, and prescribes a series of norms
apt to communicate efficiently the results of petrographic observations
in a scientific article or technical report. For quantitative analysis, the
Gazzi-Dickinson method is recommended in order to get rid of the
geometrical effects related to breakage of coarse-grained rock frag-
ments into their monomineralic constituents (Ingersoll et al., 1984;
Zuffa, 1985), and thus isolate the component of grain-size-dependent
intrasample and intersample compositional variability associated with
provenance and hydraulic sorting in the depositional environment
(Garzanti et al., 2009). It is fundamental to use a detailed point-
counting sheet (e.g., Fig. 5) that allows collection of data on the com-
plete spectrum of rock fragments in the sample and to recalculate
petrographic parameters according to both Gazzi-Dickinson QFL and
traditional QFR methods. All quartz, both monocrystalline and poly-
crystalline, should be included in pole Q, and all sedimentary lithics,
including chert, extrabasinal carbonate and evaporite, should be in-
cluded in pole L (Zuffa, 1980).
The essential information thus obtained can be condensed in a
composite adjective based on the relative abundance of quartz, feld-
spar, and lithic fragments. According to standard use (Crook, 1960;
Dickinson, 1970), the less abundant component goes first, the more
abundant last. For lithic-rich sand and sandstone, information on the
prevailing rock fragment type can be communicated by an additional
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Earth-Science Reviews 192 (2019) 545–563
adjective (Ingersoll, 1983). For lithic-poor sand and sandstone, further
formal subdivisions are proposed, thus reaching a total of 18 compo-
sitional fields overall. This scheme proves to be sufficiently complete to
formulate a clear description of any sand or sandstone sample intended
to be short and exhaustive, precise and flexible at the same time, as
documented with examples of modern sand in major rivers, eolian dune
fields, and deep-sea fans.
Acknowledgments
This article is dedicated to Bob Folk and Bill Dickinson, who taught
me far more than the riddles of sandstone petrography. Ray Ingersoll
and Gert Jan Weltje kindly provided masterly reviews, advice, and
extremely useful constructive critical comments. Unpublished petro-
graphic data used in this study were obtained by Giovanni Vezzoli,
Alberto Resentini, and Matteo Sala from samples kindly provided by
A.Haedke and H.Wittman (world rivers), A. Stone (Kalahari), Y.
Najman, Laura Fielding, J.Roskin, L. Baglioni, R.Bitonte, and
D.Roncoroni (Sahara).
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