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A Lower Palaeozoic shallow water sequence in the eastern European Variscides (SW Poland): provenance and depositional history

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Abstract

The Gackowa Formation of inferred Cambrian —Ordovician age is part of the metamorphosed pre-Variscan basement of the southern Kaczawa Mountains of the Sudetes region, south-west Poland. Previously variously interpreted as lavas, tuffs and sandstones, it is shown to consist of about 200 m of originally well-sorted siliclastic sedimentary rocks within a sequence of predominantly mafic volcanic rocks. Four facies have been distinguished based on relict sedimentary structures and textures and these suggest that deposition took place on a storm-dominated shelf, mostly above the wave base. The petrography, detrital zircon morphologies and geochemistry suggest affinity with, and derivation in large part from, acid volcanic rocks at a comparable stratigraphic position in a separate tectonostratigraphic unit to the south. The Gackowa Formation and its acid volcanic source rocks have a clear continental geochemical signature, in contrast with the mantle-derived basic/bimodal volcanic rocks below and above; it is suggested that the parent acid magma originated by crustal melting during the ascent of these mantle-derived magmas. A continental crust setting is inferred for the deposition of the Gackowa Formation sandstones, thus suggesting a continental setting for the associated within-plate basalts. The entire volcanic/sedimentary succession resembles elements of the Lower Palaeozoic of Germany, and all may have formed in an initial rift setting during Late Precambrian to Ordovician times.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Geological Sciences, Wroc\/law University, ul. Cybulskiego 30, 50-205, Wroc\/law, Poland

    Ryszard Kryza & Krzysztof Turniak

  2. Department of Geology, A. Mickiewicz University, Maków Polnych 16, 61-606, Poznań, Poland

    Andrzej Muszyński

  3. British Geological Survey, Keyworth, NG125GG, Nottingham, UK

    Jan A. Zalasiewicz

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  1. Ryszard Kryza
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  2. Krzysztof Turniak
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  3. Andrzej Muszyński
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  4. Jan A. Zalasiewicz
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Kryza, R., Turniak, K., Muszyński, A. et al. A Lower Palaeozoic shallow water sequence in the eastern European Variscides (SW Poland): provenance and depositional history. Geol Rundsch 83, 5–19 (1994). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00211891

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