RIFT-RELATED DEVONIAN SEDIMENTATION AND BASIN DEVELOPMENT IN SOUTH CHINA

During Devonian times South China lay to the north of the Palaeo-Tethy an ocean, the boundary being a passive continental margin. A shallow s ea covered the southern parts of the continent while northern areas, f orming the Huanan Landmass, were emergent. At the beginning of the Dev onian most of South China was above sea level. Subsequent transgressio n from the south gave rise to an irregular coastline with the developm ent of many fault-controlled gulfs. Further transgression led to the d evelopment of an epicontinental sea with reefs forming along the margi ns of the submerged gulfs and black shales deposited within them. By E msian time a widespread carbonate platform was established, while anox ic deposition continued in the troughs. The marine transgression peake d in the Frasnian Stage. During Famennian time widespread regression o ccurred and much of South China became once more emergent. Peneplanati on of the Huanan Landmass led to the partial infilling of many of the older fault-bounded depressions. Throughout the Devonian the local dis tribution of sediments was strongly controlled by NE-SW trending trans tensional faults that bounded NW-SE trending normal faults. These stru ctures continued to influence sedimentation in the Late Palaeozoic, th e Mesozoic and possibly the Tertiary in the offshore Beibu Gulf Basin. Copyright (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd