Abstract:

The Cycladic Basement (CB) and the overlying Cycladic Blueschist Unit (CBU) are part of the Paleogene Cycladic subduction complex exposed in Miocene metamorphic core complexes in the distended back-arc of the retreating Hellenic subduction zone of the southern Aegean. While the Cenozoic tectono-metamorphic evolutions of the CB and the CBU have been the foci of numerous studies, this study presents new laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry bedrock and detrital zircon (DZ) U-Pb ages that place robust constraints on the presubduction tectonic, magmatic, and paleogeographic evolution of the CB. Zircon U-Pb ages of crystalline CB are $\sim$306-330 Ma, demonstrating local plutonism associated with regional voluminous, protracted Carboniferous magmatism related to Paleo-Tethys subduction. The plutons intruded the CB metasedimentary host-rock sequence, characterized by distinct Gondwanan DZ U-Pb provenance, Neoproterozoic to early Paleozoic maximum depositional ages, and synmagmatic, contact metamorphic zircon rims ($\sim$300-330 Ma). DZ U-Pb dating revealed postmagmatic Permian metasedimentary rocks ($\sim$270-295 Ma) that unconformably overlie the CB and have unimodal DZ spectra that indicate exhumation of the CB prior to Permian deposition within extensional basins, as well as mark the onset of CBU deposition prior to formation of the Pindos rift domain. These U-Pb results clarify the late Paleozoic-early Mesozoic evolution of the CB as a peri-Gondwanan terrane composed of Neoproterozoic and early Paleozoic metasedimentary rocks, intruded by voluminous Carboniferous arc magmatism, and exhumed in the Permian, prior to Triassic rifting and CBU deposition. Additionally, these data provide a chronostratigraphic framework and illuminate subduction-related juxtaposition within the CB metasedimentary sequence.