Twenty-one constant strain rate compression tests have been performed on 80 ml/kg (20 GPT) Anvil Points oil shale at elevated temperatures (50 to 200/sup 0/C) and confining pressures (0.5 to 40 MPa). The strength of oil shale increases with confining pressure and decreases with temperature. Ductility is greatly enhanced by addition of confining pressure. Elevated temperatures have little influence on ductility at low confining pressures; however, at greater confining pressures, temperature exerts a progressively stronger influence on ductility. A purely empirical failure law, incorporating the effects of temperature and confining pressure, has been fitted to the data. The failure law is in good agreement with the results of other studies on the compressive strength of oil shale. All specimens in this study exhibited some fracturing in post-test examination. However, with increasing temperature and confining pressure, plots of compressive differential stress versus axial strain tend to level off after an initial transient period of increasing stress. This indicates that (1) we are approaching the brittle-ductile transition, and (2) time-dependent effects may be important under physical conditions comparable to those of this study.