Dating granulite-facies structures and the exhumation of lower crust in the Moldanubian Zone of the Bohemian Massif

Abstract

Deformation of granulite-facies rocks in the Moldanubian Zone of the southern Bohemian Massif is expressed in two intersecting planar fabrics – steeply disposed (S₁) and flat-laying (S₂) – which correspond to two deformation stages (D₁) and (D₂). The existing Sm-Nd garnet ages from banded granulite gneisses, new U-Pb zircon data from deformed granite intrusions within the granulite gneisses, and the P–T and field structural relations constrain the ages and P–T conditions of the two deformation phases. The early deformation (D₁) was associated with a HP-HT metamorphic stage with a minimum age of ca. 354 Ma which was followed by a near-isothermal decompression. A concordant U-Pb zircon age of 318±1 Ma dates the emplacement of intrusions of deformed granite into the granulite gneisses and constrains deformation phase (D₂). This phase was associated with an LP–HT metamorphism dated in the region at ca. 340–330 Ma. The available structural and isotopic data indicate that granulites in the southern Bohemian Massif were exhumed from lower to middle crust during compression. The structural relations and P–T–t data for the studied granulites are consistent with their exhumation by near-vertical extrusion of the softened orogenic root.