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Basalt breccia (section)

Breccia. Notice the angular nature of the large clasts

Tertiary breccia at Resting Springs Pass, Mojave Desert, California.

Tomb of Umberto I in the Pantheon.

Original pavement of the Forum of Trajan in Rome

Marble breccia from Naples.

Breccia statue of the Ancient Egyptian goddess Tawaret.

Breccia is a type of rock formed of broken fragments of minerals or rock cemented together by a fine-grained matrix. The matrix may be similar to or different from the composition of the fragments.

Rocks formed by sticking together pieces of previous rocks (clasts) are called clastic rocks. There are two types of clastic rock: conglomerates and breccias. What divides these two categories is the amount of rounding. The particles that make up conglomerates are well rounded, whereas in breccias they are angular.