Convergence in a thermally softened thick crust: Variscan intracontinental tectonics in Iberian plate rocks

Abstract

AbstractThe subduction phase in the development of the Variscan Orogen in SW Europe was followed by an extended period of ‘intracontinental’ tectonics. The progressive temperature rise in the hinterland during plate convergence was accompanied by widespread partial melting in the lower crust and the nucleation of kilometric buckle folds and crustal‐scale shear zones in the stronger upper crust. Thermal mechanical weakening in the core of the orogen was contemporaneous with shortening and thickening in the foreland fold‐and‐thrust belt. We evaluate lithospheric strength profiles in the hinterland and foreland based on the metamorphic and structural record for three tectonic stages. We find that lower crustal strength varied in space as well as in time during orogenesis. Strength contrasts between the foreland and the hot hinterland during convergence may have led to the additional indentation of the foreland into the hinterland of the Ibero‐Armorican Arc.