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Geological Society, London, Special Publications; 1993; v. 74; p. 299-321;
DOI: 10.1144/GSL.SP.1993.074.01.21
© 1993 Geological Society of London

Tethyan Himalaya

Sedimentology and tectonic implications of the Lamayuru Complex: deep-water facies of the Indian passive margin, Indus Suture Zone, Ladakh Himalaya

Alastair H. F. Robertson & Paul J. Degnan

Department of Geology and Geophysics, Grant Institute, West Mains Road, Edinburgh EH9 3JW, UK

The Lamayuru Complex, exposed in the Indus Suture Zone of the Ladakh Himalaya, comprises remnants of the Triassic to Upper Cretaceous, north-facing Indian passive margin. This margin experienced pulses of extension and/or transtension in the Late Permian, early Mid-Jurassic, Late Jurassic and Early Cretaceous. Two areas studied preserve mainly relatively intact slope, to base-of-slope settings.

Initial sea-floor spreading in the Late Permian is reflected in early deposition of base-of-slope turbidites in the Lamayuru Complex, and exotic limestones and volcanics in associated melange units. Quartzose turbidites, calciturbidites and shales then accumulated in slope, to base-of-slope settings during the Triassic and Early Jurassic, related to subsidence of the adjacent Zanskar shelf after spreading began. The carbonate platform edge underwent drastic extensional collapse in the early Mid-Jurassic (Aalenian), giving rise to limestone ‘exotics’ in the west and carbonate-filled submarine channels in the east. Extension related alkaline volcanism, dated as Mid-Late Jurassic by radiolarians, exploited the inferred continent-boundary area in the west. Mixed quartzose clastic, volcaniclastic, radiolarian and pelagic carbonates accumulated in the Cretaceous, but remain poorly dated. Radiolarian cherts reflect siliceous plankton productivity along the passive margin. During the latest Cretaceous, ophiolitic melange was accreted at a trench within the Tethys ocean to the north, but there is, as yet, no definite evidence of emplacement onto the Zanskar shelf until formation of an early Eocene foredeep, followed by emplacement of the Spontang ophiolite and related melange.





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