A section across a tethyan suture in northwestern turkey

A section across a major Tethyan suture in northwestern Turkey is described in detail. The suture of Early Tertiary age juxtaposes two continental blocks with distinct stratigraphic, structural, and metamorphic features. The Sakarya Zone in the north is represented by Permo-Triassic accretion-subduction complexes, which are unconformably overlain by Jurassic to Paleocene sedimentary rocks. The Anatolide-Tauride Block to the south of the suture consists of two tectonic zones. The Tavsanli Zone consists of a coherent blueschist sequence with Late Cretaceous isotopic ages. This blueschist sequence is tectonically overlain by Cretaceous oceanic accretionary complexes and peridotite slabs. The Bornova Flysch Zone consists of Triassic to Cretaceous limestone blocks in an uppermost Cretaceous to Paleocene flysch. The suture is represented by a N-vergent thrust fault separating lithologies from these two continental blocks. The orogenic history of the region can be considered in two stages. In the Late Cretaceous, the northern margin of the Anatolide-Tauride Block was subducted under the Tethyan oceanic lithosphere and was metamorphosed in blueschist-facies conditions. Blueschists were largely exhumed by the latest Cretaceous or early Paleocene, prior to the continental collision. In the second stage, during the Paleocene, the continent-continent collision produced a doubly vergent orogen involving both S- and N-vergent thrusting, but did not lead to major crustal thickening.