A sapphirine-cordierite-garnet-sillimanite granulite from Enderby Land, Antarctica: implications for FMAS petrogenetic grids in the granulite facies

Abstract

A quartz-absent magnesian paragneiss layer from Mount Sones, in the Archaean Napier complex of Enderby Land, Antarctica, contains the stable divariant FMAS assemblage sapphirine (XMg=78) — cordierite (XMg=87) — garnet (XMg=51) — sillimanite. Rare green spinel (XMg=53.5, ZnO=2.65wt%) occurs as inclusions mainly within sapphirine, but also within sillimanite and garnet. Late thin coronas of cordierite (XMg=90.5) mantle sapphirine in contact with extensively exsolved anorthoclase. The mineral textures are interpreted to indicate the former stability of a hypersthene-quartz absent assemblage followed by the development of the FMAS equilibrium assemblage sapphirine-cordierite-garnet-sillimanite (sp, hy, qz) and further divariant reaction involving the consumption of sapphirine. The (sp, hy, qz) assemblage uniquely defines the stable P-T reaction topology appropriate to granulites from the Napier Complex, as this paragenesis is allowed in the grids of Hensen (1971, 1986) but is not possible in other grids which assume the stability of a sapphirine-absent ([sa]) FMAS invariant point involving the phases spinel, garnet, hypersthene, cordierite, sillimanite and quartz. The observed mineral assemblages and textures are consistent with peak metamorphism between the [sp] and [hy] invariant points of Hensen (1971), at temperatures of 930–990° C, followed by cooling on a lower dP/dT trajectory towards the (sp, qz) univariant line. The initial spinel-bearing assemblage was stabilized by Zn and to a lesser extent by Ni and Cr, and hence does not require a marked decrease in temperature and increase in pressure to produce the (sp, hy, qz) assemblage. It is inferred that fO2 conditions substantially lower than those used in the experiments of Annersten and Seifert (1981) prevailed in the high-grade metamorphism in the Napier Complex.