page_title: Old Red Sandstone
section_title: Use as a building stone
hierarchical_section_title: Old Red Sandstone / Use as a building stone
caption_attribution_description: Ruins of St. Helen's chapel on the clifftop to the west of Siccar Point.
context_page_description: The Old Red Sandstone is an assemblage of rocks in the North Atlantic region largely of Devonian age. It extends in the east across Great Britain, Ireland and Norway, and in the west along the northeastern seaboard of North America. It also extends northwards into Greenland and Svalbard. These areas were a part of the ancient continent of Euramerica/Laurussia. In Britain it is a lithostratigraphic unit to which stratigraphers accord supergroup status and which is of considerable importance to early paleontology. For convenience the short version of the term, ORS is often used in literature on the subject. The term was coined to distinguish the sequence from the younger New Red Sandstone which also occurs widely throughout Britain.
context_section_description: The Old Red Sandstone has been widely used as a building stone across those regions where it outcrops. Notable examples of its use can be found in the area surrounding Stirling, Stonehaven, Perth and Tayside. The inhabitants of Caithness at the northeastern tip of Scotland also used the stone to a considerable extent.  Old Red Sandstone has also frequently been used in buildings in Herefordshire, Monmouthshire and the former Brecknockshire (now south Powys) of south Wales.
caption: St. Helen's Chapel at Siccar Point has walls faced in Old Red Sandstone, with greywacke used on the inner face and surrounding drystane dykes.
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