The Pyrenees: Subduction and collision?

Abstract

This paper presents a new interpretation of the Pyrenees. After Early Cretaceous rifting, two stable Atlantic-type continental margins formed during the Late Cretaceous. Flysch-type sediments were then deposited in a deep east-west basin. During the latest Cretaceous and Early Eocene, this basin underwent subduction towards the south. We propose that the present-day Pyrenees result from collision between a northern stable margin (Aquitaine Basin and Sub-Pyrenean Belt) and an active southern margin (Pyrenees proper). According to this interpretation, the pre-Mesozoic basement of the North Pyrenean Zone may represent the intermediate continental crust of the Cretaceous stable margin. © 1977.