Hans Stille

Hans Wilhelm Stille (8 October 1876 – 26 December 1966) was an influential German geologist working primarily on tectonics and the collation of tectonic events during the Phanerozoic. Stille adhered to the contracting Earth hypothesis and together with Leopold Kober he worked on the geosyncline theory to explain orogeny. Stille's ideas emerged in the aftermath of Eduard Suess' book ''Das Antlitz der Erde'' (1883–1909). Stille's and Kober's school of thought was one of two that emerged in the post-Suess era the other being headed by Alfred Wegener and Émile Argand. This competing view rejected Earth contraction and argued for continental drift. As Stille opposed continental drift he came to be labelled a "fixist".

Part of Stille's work dealt with massifs and sedimentary basins in Central Europe; differing from Suess' interpretations for the same area showing that between the Bohemian and Rhine massifs Mesozoic rocks were folded.

A central tenet in Stille's geology was that geosynclines became depressions without any faulting with any fault found being the product of later processes like the final collapse of the geosyncline.

In 1933 Stille would shorten Leopold Kober's concept of ''kratogen'', that was used to describe those portions of the continental crust that were old and stable, into ''kraton'' (). The ''Geotectonic Research'' journal was founded in 1937 by Hans Stille and Franz Lotze.

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