Short Paper: Cadomian terrane tectonics and magmatism in the Armorican Massif

Abstract

The North Armorican composite terrane, NW France, is a collage of displaced terranes which result from the amalgamation of Cadomian continental arcs and marginal basin complexes by sinistral transpression along a continental margin above a subduction zone. Early Cadomian arc activity occurred at c. 700-650 Ma, but terrane accretion did not occur until c. 540 Ma, and post-tectonic magmatism persisted well into the Palaeozoic. Cadomian events thus span a considerably greater period than previously supposed.