Precambrian rocks in northwest Scotland west of the Moine Thrust

Neoproterozoic?Early Paleozoic evolution of peri-Gondwanan terranes: implications for Laurentia-Gondwana connections

“…Following the recommendation of Winchester (1988), we included palinspastic reconstructions of northwestern Scandinavia and eastern Greenland that removes several hundreds of kilometers of Caledonian shortening in both cases. Similar margin restorations were done by Winchester (1988), Soper et al (1992), Park et al (1994), Fairchild and Hambrey (1995), Higgins et al (2001) and others. Such palinspastic restorations are necessary to avoid strong overlapping of the continental blocks during the spherical rotations.…”

“…Popov et al (2002) correctly pointed out a similarity of the Komagnes/Sredny poles to the Jurassic part of the European Apparent Polar Wander Path, suggesting a Jurassic remagnetisation for these dykes. The "upside down" model also contradicts the geological data -the correlation of the Precambrian crustal blocks and orogens in Laurentia and Baltica (e.g., Winchester 1988;Hoffman 1989;Gorbatschev and Bogdanova 1993;Park et al 1994;Karlstrom et al 1999), the absence of any traces of the Grenvillian orogeny in the eastern margin of Baltica, the provenance studies (Willner et al 2003) and others. Probably the strongest argument against the "upside down" model is the tectonic regime in the eastern Baltica in Neoproterozoic.…”

Garnet compositions in Scottish and Norwegian basement terrains: a framework for interpretation of North Sea sandstone provenance

“…The majority of the Lewisian outcrop consists of quartzofeldspathic gneisses, but basic intrusions are widespread. The basic intrusions include the Scourie dykes, believed to have been intruded at c. 2400 Ma, and a suite of younger dykes dated as c. 2000 Ma (Fettes, Mendum, Smith, & Watson, 1992;Park, Cliff, Fettes, & Stewart, 1994). The Lewisian also includes larger areas of basic gneisses and some metasedimentary rocks.…”

The initiation and early tectonic significance of the Outer Hebrides Fault Zone, Scotland

“…The same authors also believed that the Laxfordian granitic pegmatites cross-cut and therefore post-dated the earliest mylonitic fabrics preserved in the low strain augen. On this basis, Lailey, Stein & Reston (1989) argued that the initiation of ductile, top-to-the-NW thrusting predated the intrusion of basic dykes at c. 2400 Ma, and probably occurred during the Inverian event that is dated on the Scottish mainland at c. 2500 Ma (Park et al 1994).…”