A Pan-African ‘Humite Epoch’ in East Gondwana: implications for Neoproterozoic Gondwana geometry

Abstract

The plate geometries during Neoproterozoic time have been reconstructed using humite occurrences for the first time. These occurrences are also used to demonstrate the hitherto undocumented humite epoch dominated by extremely water-rich, fluorinated, fluid activity during the Pan-African event. Humite-bearing marbles occur in the Kerala Khondalite Belt of southernmost India, South Madagascar, Sri Lanka and the Lutzow–Holm Complex of East Antarctica. These occurrences prompt a fit of these areas with the Tanzania–Mozambique region of Africa and suggest an intercontinental humite epoch coeval with the waning stages of Pan-African activity extending from the Lutzow–Holm complex of East Antarctica upto the East African Orogen along the eastern flanks of the Mozambique Belt. The modified Smith and Hallam fit of continents finds support in this study.