The exploitation of the Coal Measures and other Carboniferous age strata in the Ironbridge area made it one of the birthplaces of the Industrial Revolution.
The oldest rocks in Shropshire are of Precambrian age and are to be found at Rushton, a mile west of The Wrekin, as schists and gneisses.
South West of Church Stretton bordering Wales, is the very rural area of Clun Forest formed largely from Silurian age rocks.
Igneous intrusions outcropping at the surface in South Shropshire are few and small, but much larger bodies are believed to exist at shallow depths, evidenced by geophysical anomalies and radon-bearing groundwater.
Late Precambrian (Neoproterozoic) rocks occur either side of the Church Stretton valley and in the vicinity of the Wrekin and Haughmond Hill, each intimately associated with the Welsh Borderland Fault System.
Lower Comley shales and sandstones also occur in a small and largely fault-bound area at Lilleshall alongside mudstones and siltstones of the Dolgellau Formation.
Immediately to its southeast is the discontinuous strike valley known as Hope Dale which is formed within the siltstones and mudstones of the Lower Ludlow Shales.
Small fault-defined inliers of parts of this sequence occur in the Neen Sollars and Caynham areas of the south of the county.
Northwest of the Church Stretton Fault Zone, the Pentamerus and Purple Shales wrap around the southern and western margins of the block of Precambrian rocks of the Long Mynd and the district extending west to the Vale of Montgomery.
[7] The earliest Carboniferous rocks, the Village Farm and Jackie Parr Limestone formations, are seen in the Lilleshall inlier where they unconformably overlie the Old Red Sandstone sequence.
The southeastern margin of the deep Wem-Audlem Sub-basin, at the heart of the southern part of the Cheshire Basin is defined within Shropshire by the northeast-southwest trending Wem Fault.
Much of this flat area is covered by more recent deposits but sandstone hills are prominent at Ruyton, Nesscliffe, Myddle, Grinshill and Hawkstone.
These are both unconformably overlain by the Bridgnorth Sandstone, formerly thought to be Triassic in age, best exposed in the cliffs of the town which has lent them its name.
Though largely concealed, outcrops of Dyrham Formation sandstones and mudstones near Prees are of Pliensbachian age and hence wholly Jurassic.
A sill of microgabbro (dolerite) was intruded into the Pennine Coal Measures rocks at Kinlet during the Bolsovian stage of the Carboniferous.
At this point Irish Sea Ice having advanced south across the Cheshire Plain reached as far as Wenlock Edge and the Wolverhampton area.
Ice tongues from the Welsh Icesheet reached down the Teme, Clun and Onny valleys to the south of Long Mynd and Stiperstones though the higher ground remained ice-free.
Southeast Shropshire remained unaffected by glaciers though as with other areas rising above the ice surface, the landscape was affected by intense periglaciation.
Erratics within the till can be traced back to granite outcrops in southern Scotland and the Lake District as well as sources which are closer.
The currently accepted explanation involves the proven existence of a major subglacial trench (now infilled by later sediments) beneath the ice sheet west of Shrewsbury and leading towards the gorge.
Large quantities of water under considerable pressure were able to then move uphill and over the pre-existing watershed east of Buildwas, powerfully eroding it in the process and giving rise to the modern gorge feature, possibly during multiple glacial phases.
The deeply incised Marrington Dingle conveys the Camlad north from Churchstoke and originates as the outflow from a glacial lake in the Churchstoke/Snead area.
The Plowden gorge permits the Onny to flow east around the southern end of the Long Mynd and was also initiated by meltwater.
[16] Sediment-filled valleys are recorded from the Telford area, one of which, the Lightmoor Channel, runs southeast from Madeley on a line sub-parallel to that of the Severn gorge.
[17] During deglaciation, ice masses often wasted away in situ to leave kettle holes, some of which remain today as part of the county's population of meres; there is a notable assemblage in the Ellesmere area.
[18] Freeze-thaw cycles operated on the exposed quartzites of Stiperstones leading to the development of rock tors and of patterned ground i.e. stone stripes and polygons.
There are numerous landslips recorded within the Ironbridge gorge and further downstream around Apley Forge and along parts of the Borley Brook, near Highley.