The Just for Fun List of "Ology"s

With all the “ology”s floating around in everyday vocabulary, I thought it would be interesting to provide some definitions so that someone could impress their friends with a few big words. Not all of these are “ology”s but you’ll get the idea.

Geology: The study of the earth, its rocks, minerals, fossils, and all earth building processes.

Mineralogy: The study of minerals. What they are used for, how they are formed and what they can be used for.

Crystallography: The study of crystals, natural or man-made, for the purpose of gaining knowledge on the creation of new materials and how to use them.

Lithology: The study of rocks in hand-size samples. This is useful for studying how geologic features are formed, including ore bodies.

Petrology: The study of rocks and how they are related.

Stratigraphy: The study of layers in sedimentary rocks.

Sedimentology: The study of how sedimentary rocks form.

Structural Geology: The study of forces on earth systems including earthquakes, volcanos, and building large structures on the ground.

Volcanism: The study of volcanoes.

Psycho-Geodeology*: The attempt to predict what is inside a geode before it is cut or broken open.

Leaverite: A rock, when found while collecting in the field, which is best left right where it was found. Leave ‘er right there!

Lapidary: The art of taking any rock, or rock type material, and polishing it to make it more desirable.

Tele-identification*: What people expect us to do at the rockshop when they call and ask us to identify their rocks over the phone using terms like rounded, redish, and large.

Crystal-Ball Apprasialogy*: Method of appraising rocks which you can not see. We are often asked to do this when people call or come in without their rocks, and want to know how much they are worth.

Myth-Crystollography*: When someone wants legendary crystals or stones such as Merlin’s stone and the Arkenstone, which don’t really exist (or do they)?

Hyper-identology* - When somebody brings in a very common and cheap rock (leaverite – see above) or mineral and wants us to tell them its incredibly rare and valuable. Often arguing for extended periods of time over it value.

* indicates terms that may only be used in our rock shop.

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