Prof Ferdinand Zirkel FRS(For) HFRSE (20 May 1838 – 11 June 1912) was a German geologist and petrographer.

In 1860 he traveled to Iceland with William Thierry Preyer, and in 1862 they published Reise nach Island im Sommer 1860.

His journey to Iceland, along with travels to the Faeroe Islands, Scotland and England, and a meeting with Henry Clifton Sorby, led him from mining to the study of microscopical petrography, then a comparatively new science.

[1] He traveled for study in France, Italy, and Scotland; came to the United States in 1874 to examine the great collections of minerals made during the exploration of the fortieth degree of latitude; and in 1894-95 pursued scientific investigations in Ceylon and India.

1893, 1894); Die mikroskopische Beschaffenheit der Mineralien und Gesteine (1873);[1] and Über Urausscheidungen rheinischer Basalte (1893).