Lost Terranes of Zealandia: possible development of late Paleozoic and early Mesozoic sedimentary basins at the southwest Pacific margin of Gondwanaland, and their destination as terranes in southern South America.

Abstract

Latest Precambrian to Ordovician metasedimentary successions and Cambrian-Ordovician and Devonian-Carboniferous granitoids form the major part of the basement of southern Zealandia and adjacent sectors of Antarctica and southeast Australia. Uplift/cooling ages of these rocks, and local Devonian shallow-water cover sequences suggest that final consolidation ofthe basement occurred through Late Paleozoic time. Anecessary consequence ofthis process would have been contemporaneous erosion and the substantial development of marine sedimentary basins at the Pacific margin of Zealandia. These are found nowhere at the present day, suggesting that the basins have been lost by tectonic erosion, perhaps in a margin-parallel dextral translation similar to late Paleozoic-Mesozoic suspect terranes of New Zealand. A probable detrital zircon age pattern is assembled for these lost Zealandia sediments, and then compared with those of pre-Jurassic (probable Triassic to Devonian) metasedimentary rocks in the Chilean archipelago. Significant Mesoproterozoic, latest Neoproterozoic-Cambrian and Devonian-Carboniferous detrital zircon age components are common to both, thus supporting a possible Chilean terrane destination for these 'lost terranes of Zealandia'.