Abstract
The Boulder Bed and the Merensky Reef occur in the upper portions of the critical zone of the Bushveld Complex. Their origin has been the subject of much debate and so a general review of the more significant literature is presented. An investigation of these occurrences in the Rustenburg area has drawn parallels between their geological settings and geochemistry. Both phenomena display similar features, including aggregates of orthopyroxene, marginal layers of chromitite and coincident bulk chemical and mineralogical trends. The Boulder Bed and the Merensky Reef may be equated on this basis with the spherical orthopyroxenite aggregates previously reported by us from the main zone of the Bushveld Complex in the eastern Transvaal. The formation of these phenomena in the critical zone may be related to the process of spherical agglomeration, whereby orthopyroxene grains were accreted by means of an immiscible bridging liquid which formed in the volatile-rich magma trapped beneath an anorthosite layer.
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