Seismostratigraphy and Neogene-Recent depositional history of the south central continental margin of Cyprus

Abstract

The Neogene-Recent depositional history and tectonic setting of offshore and onshore central southern Cyprus can be correlated using offshore seismic data and onshore geology. Seismic data allow the south Cyprus continental margin to be divided into a narrow inner shelf area and a wider, irregular outer slope area. The well known top Messinian reflector is recognized over the slope and western part of the shelf. To the east, an inferred Quaternary, ?eustatically-induced erosion surface, possibly a drowned marine terrace, has been cut into lithified Miocene sediments. Zones of folding in the offshore Miocene sequence can be traced onshore, where they correlate with several WNW-ESE trending structural lineaments of Miocene age. The formation of the lineaments is attributed to compression resulting from northwards subduction to the south of Cyprus. Plio-Quaternary sediments are relatively thin to absent along the shelf of south central Cyprus, but thicken across the slope where they infill end Miocene topography. Their distribution is consistent with evidence from onshore which indicates an end to deformation in southern Cyprus around the close of the Miocene, relative inactivity in the Pliocene and relative uplift in the Quaternary. The end of deformation in the Pliocene may relate to southwards ‘roll-back’ of the inferred subduction zone trench.