Tectonics of the Akamas and Mamonia ophiolites, Western Cyprus: magnetic petrofabrics and paleomagnetism

Abstract

The Akamas ophiolite is shown to be a distal, off-axis extension of the main outcrop of Cretaceous ophiolite in the Troodos complex of Cyprus. Mantle-sequence harzburgites of both ophiolites share similarly oriented mantle-flow fabrics and the same Tertiary magnetizations acquired during exhumation. However, compared with the Troodos mantle sequence rocks, the Akamas ferromagnetic mineralogy is more oxidized and remanences with lower blocking temperatures were acquired chemically. Paleopoles calculated from published vectors and our own new data define an apparent polar wander path (APWP) for the Troodos microplate. The APWP shows that between 88 and ∼50 Ma the Troodos microplate was equatorial and the vertical axis for its 60° anticlockwise rotation was located within the microplate. Subsequently, the microplate drifted northward to 34°N with minor anticlockwise rotation at a reduced rate. That requires microplate-rotation about a vertical axis located to the west of Cyprus in the last ∼50 Ma. The allochthonous Triassic Mamonia terrane docked with the Cretaceous Troodos terrane in SW Cyprus. Within it, disrupted tectonized ophiolite has been regarded as part of a Triassic ocean floor or as sheared fragments of Cretaceous Troodos ophiolite, incorporated into the Mamonia terrane when it docked with the Troodos terrane. Whatever their provenance, their paleomagnetic signals postdate their penetrative deformation and metamorphism and their paleopoles may still be used to track their post-strain motion. Our calculations of paleopoles from published vectors for the Mamonia terrane smear along an extension of the APWP for the Troodos microplate that is, moreover, concentric with the Troodos microplate. This suggests that the paleopole dispersion of the Triassic Mamonia rocks and their post-magnetization disruption occurred during their accretion onto the anticlockwise-spinning Troodos microplate.