The Cretaceous conglomerates from Piatra Craiului syncline (South Carpathians, Romania): searching for the source area

The Aptian Gura Râului conglomerates (Southern Carpathians): remains of an extended subaqueous gravity flow deposit from the eastern flank of the Getic Nappe

“…Their age was in ferred by com par ing these de pos its with sim i lar, Upper Albian-Cenomanian ammonite-bear ing con glom er ates from the Dâmbovicioara Zone (Toula, 1897;Simionescu, 1897;Popovici-Haïeg, 1898) and the north ern part of the Ghimbavu Moun tain (Patrulius and Dimitriu, 1962). The gen eral mass of these con glom er ates con tains interbedded mas sive car bon ate brec cias, metre-scale lime stone olistoliths (Popescu, 1966) and rare meta mor phic blocks (Ungureanu et al, 2017). Ungureanu et al (2015) stud ied the con tact be tween the basal part of these con glom er ates and the over ly ing Tithonian --Lower Valanginian car bon ate suc ces sion from the Piatra Craiului Mas sif.…”

“…Their ma trix con tains orbitolinid-rich asso ci a tions which in di cate an Up per Aptian age. Ungureanu et al (2017) iden ti fied pos si ble source ar eas for the Piatra Craiului con glom er ate de pos its by de scrib ing in de tail their clast li thol ogy, clast morphometry and palaeoflow di rections. Ma trix and peb ble lithological anal y sis in di cates the follow ing par tic u lar i ties for the Aptian Gura Râului con glom er ates:…”

“…A -geo log i cal map of the re gion (1:50 000) and the study ar eas (GR -Gura Râului; PZ1 -Prăpăstiile Zărneştilor; DL -Drumul lui Lehman; PF -Padinile Frumoase; G1, G2 -Grind; B -Brusturet; P -Pietricica (re drawn from Dimitrescu et al, 1971;Patrulius et al, 1971;Săndulescu et al, 1972;Dimitrescu et al, 1974, with slight changes); B -syn thetic col umn of the sed i men tary suc ces sion from the Piatra Craiului Mas sif, from Ungureanu et al (2017); C -ex cerpt from the tec tonic map of the Alps, Carpathians and Dinarides, re drawn from Schmid et al (2008); D -geo log i cal cross-sec tion through the north ern part of the Piatra Craiului Mas sif and Bran Pass (re drawn from Jekelius, 1938, with mi nor changes)…”

“…The same meth od ol ogy was used to iden tify the source area of the up per most Albian-Cenomanian con glom er ates. Accord ing to Ungureanu et al (2017) car bon ate peb bles are domi nant (~88%) while meta mor phic and si li ceous clasts are scarce. Microfacies and micropalaeontological anal y sis performed on car bon ate peb bles in di cate a Mid dle Ju ras sic-Lower Cre ta ceous source area for the con glom er ates (Ungureanu et al, 2017).…”

The distinctive character of lumpy limestones (Early Jurassic, Lusitanian Basin, W Portugal)

“…A detailed analysis of the lithic elements encased in ancient carbonate deposits can provide insights on depositional conditions and basin evolution by elucidating on an array of processes involved in forming and/or delivering these materials to their final destination (e.g., Alfaro et al, ; Coimbra et al, ; Coimbra, Immenhauser, & Olóriz, ; Gupta, ; Jenkyns, ; Li, Li, Shan, Gong, & Yu, ; Ungureanu et al, ). For this purpose, several aspects are typically investigated, including sedimentological analysis, macro‐ to microfacies analysis, morphometric evaluations, and geochemical composition (Bouchette, Séguret, & Moussine‐Pouchkine, ; Chen, ; Coimbra, Immenhauser, Olóriz, Rodríguez‐Galiano, & Chica‐Olmo, ; García‐García et al, ; Hesselbo & Palmer, ; Wignall & Twitchett, ).…”