K. Gessner et al., How to resist subduction: evidence for large-scale out-of-sequence thrusting during Eocene collision in western Turkey, J GEOL SOC, 158, 2001, pp. 769-784
Significant along-strike variations have locked large parts of the Alpine s
ubduction complex in the Eastern Mediterranean in the Eocene. and defined t
he end of high-pressure accretion in western Turkey. Structural analysis re
veals that the Anatolide belt in western Turkey formed under greenschist fa
cies metamorphic conditions in the Eocene when a high-pressure metamorphic
fragment of the Adriatic plate (the Cycladic blueschist unit) was thrust on
to the imbricated mid-crustal units of the Anatolian microcontinent (the Me
nderes nappes). The contact between the Cycladic blueschist unit and the Me
nderes nappes. the Cyclades-Menderes thrust, represents an out-of-sequence
ramp which cuts up-section towards the south. The lack of Alpine high-press
ure fabrics below the Cyclades-Menderes thrust implies c. 35 km of exhumati
on of the Cycladic blueschist prior to its Eocene emplacement on top of the
Menderes nappes. Structure and geodynamic evolution of the Anatolide belt
are in striking contrast to the neighbouring Aegean and contradict the mode
l of a laterally continuous orogenic zone, in which the Anatolide microcont
inent is interpreted as an eastern extension of the Adriatic plate.