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Tectonic setting
Tectonic setting of Turkey within the Alpide-Himalayan chain. A-T: Anatolides-Taurides; P:Pontides
Take from http://web.itu.edu.tr/~okay/makalelerim/91_geology_of_turkey_anschnitt_2008.pdf
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Turkey sits on the Alpide
belt, a mountain range which extends from Java in the Pacific Ocean to the
Atlantic and includes the Alps, the Carpathians, the mountains of Asia Minor
and Iran, the Hindu Kush, the Himalayas, and the mountains of Southeast Asia.
The oldest rocks on earth form the heart of the continental plates
which move slowly over time. These ancient plates came together to form a
single continent, Pangaea, around 250ma (Million Years Ago) Pangaea formed a “C” shape around the
Tethys oceans. The Tethys oceans closed as Pangaea broke up and eastern Gondwana (Antarctica, India
and Australia) rotated and moved towards Laurasia (Asia, Europe and N.
America). The Atlantic formed when Laurasia broke up. The eastern Mediterranean
and the Indian Oceans are remnants of the Neotethys Ocean
while the western Mediterranean is geologically part of the Atlantic. The
Aegean is a relatively new sea (less than 30ma).
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Turkey is an amalgamation of several terranes and the remnants of small oceans which opened and closed again as Gondwana
moved towards Laurasia. A terrane is a fragment of
crustal material broken off one tectonic plate and "sutured" to crust
lying on another plate.
Tectonic map of
north-eastern Mediterranean region showing the major sutures and continental
blocks. Sutures
are shown by heavy lines with the polarity of former subduction zones indicated by filled triangles. Heavy lines with open triangles represent
active subduction zones. The Late Cretaceous oceanic
crust in the Black Sea is shown by grey tones. Small open triangles indicate
the vergence of the major fold and thrust belts.
Take from http://web.itu.edu.tr/~okay/makalelerim/91_geology_of_turkey_anschnitt_2008.pdf
The Anatolide – Tauride Block of Southern Turkey contains several terranes that broke off from Gondwana. The Pontides to the north of the Izmir – Ankara Suture are
derived from Lauratia. This suture represents the
final closure of the western end of the Neotethys Ocean.
Tectonic Setting
Local Geology
Geomorphology
Notes
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