O koncepcji wczesno paleozoicznych wielkich ruchów przesuwczych wzdłuż krawędzi płyty laurentyjskiej i bałtyckiej

Abstract

ON THE CONCEPT OF A MAJOR EARLY PALAEOZOIC WRENCH MOVEMENT ALONG THE EDGES OF LAURENTIAN AND BALTIC PLATES Summary A hypothesis of the Early Palaeozoic major sinistral wrench movement along the southern edges of the Laurentian and Baltic cratons has recently been advanced in several papers by Brochwicz-Lewiński et al. (4, 5, 27, 28, 29). They suppose that in the Early Ordovician - before the onset of these movements - the northern Dobrogean Block (Romania) was welded with Scotland and the southern part of British Isles lay opposite to the northern Appalachians (Fig. 1 A). The displacement was active during the Ordovician, Silurian and earliest Devonian bringing the Dalslandian-Cadomian-Grampian basement of the West-Central Europe into its approximate present position relative to the Baltic craton. This wrench- fault zone was responsible for the middle-late Caledonian deformation in a narrow belt between Ireland and the Black Sea. This hypothesis is here examined and found to be doubtful: neither have the earlier interpretations been properly discussed and proved to be invalid, nor has the new concept been sufficiently supported by the geological facts so far recorded. Following objections are raised against the idea of wrench movement. (…)