Outline structure and tectonic evolution of the Variscan Sudetes

The structure and evolution of the Polish part of the Sudetes is reviewed on the basis of published data and interpretations. The Sudetic segment of the Variscides and its adjacent areas were subjected to multi-stage accretion during successive collisional events that followed closure of different segments of the Rheic Ocean. Early Variscan deformations culminated in the Late Devonian due to docking of the Armorican terrane assemblage to the southern margin of Laurussia. The Variscan orogenic activity continued into the Carboniferous and was associated with a new collision and intense folding and thrusting, followed by abundant magmatism, gravitational collapse and resulting exhumation of deeply buried metamorphic complexes as well as by inversion of the foreland basin. In the Sudetes, Variscan tectonostratigraphic units are tectonically juxtaposed and often bear record of contrasting exhumation/cooling paths, constrained by palaeontological and geochronological data. This provides evidence for the presence of allochthonous units, of partly cryptic tectonic sutures and an of overall collage-type tectonics of that area. The main lithostratigraphical components distinguished within the Sudetes are: 1) non-metamorphic to metamorphosed Neoproterozoic igneous suites accompanied by volcano-sedimentary successions, 2) Late Cambrian granitoids gneissified during the Variscan orogeny, 3) variously metamorphosed Ordovician through Devonian volcano-sedimentary successions deposited in pre-orogenic extensional basins, 4) dismembered fragments of a Late Silurian ophiolitic complex, 5) Devonian to Lower Carboniferous sedimentary successions of a passive continental margin, 6) Carboniferous granitoids, and 7) clastic sediments of Devonian and/or Early Carboniferous intramontane basins. All these components are assembled to form part of the internal Variscan orogenic zone largely exposed within the area of the Bohemian Massif. A three-partite subdivision of the Sudetes proposed here reflects different timing of deformation and exhumation of the respective segments. The Central, West and East Sudetes were deformed and amalgamated during the Middle/Late Devonian, at the turn of the Devonian and Carboniferous and during Early Carboniferous, respectively. Problems in extending the classical tectonostratigraphic zonation of the Variscides into the Sudetes are explained as due to activity of Late Palaeozoic strike-slip faults and shear zones, disrupting and dispersing the initially more simply distributed tectonostratigraphic units into the present-day structural mosaic