Geochronology of the mid-German crystalline rise west of the River Rhine

Abstract

The mid-German crystalline rise has its westernmost exposures at the western margin of the Rhine graben in the southern Pfalz and the northern Alsace. The outcrops are made up of granitoid rocks and minor volcano-sedimentary sequences. Radiometric ages obtained by U/Pb, Pb/Pb, Sm/Nd and Rb/Sr analyses of the igneous rocks from this area range from ∼433 to ∼325 Ma thus covering a time span from the Silurian to the end of the lower Carboniferous. Because the investigated rocks are — according to their chemical composition — largely related to subduction zone environments, the following three geodynamical scenarios are postulated, always taking subduction of oceanic crust beneath the mid-German crystalline rise into account: (a) subduction of the Rheic ocean during the Silurian from the north; (b) subduction of the Rhenohercynian ocean during the late Devonian (∼369 Ma) from the north; (c) subduction of the Saxothuringian ocean during the lower Carboniferous (∼334 Ma) from the south.