Structural inheritance and cover deformation: Tertiary folding and faulting in, the western Paris Basin.

The analysis of recently recognized brittle and fold structures in the Tert iary formations of the western Paris Basin provides new evidence that this basin, usually considered as stable, recorded the Cenozoic polyphase tecton ic history of Western Europe. These folds and the associated faults probabl y formed above basement features of Hercynian age reactivated as compressiv e wrench faults during the Eocene north-south to N020 degrees Pyrenean comp ression, especially the 'Avre-Eure-Seine-Oise' lineament. The Oligocene ext ension and the Alpine compression have also been recorded by brittle micros tructures. (C) 2000 Academie des sciences / Editions scientifiques et medic ales Elsevier SAS.