Transect through the Vardar Mega Suture Zone

Abstract

In this contribution, we present the field guide that accompanies the post‐meeting excursion FT4 of the 17^th EGU Émile Argand Conference on Alpine Geological Studies. Tectonic maps of Serbia are dominated by broad, chiefly NNW–SSE belts of ophiolitic and ophiolite‐related units ‐ East Vardar, West Vardar, and Dinaric ophiolites ‐ representing dismembered fragments of Mesozoic oceanic lithosphere. These assemblages include serpentinized peridotites, gabbros, and basalts, associated with a deep‐marine sediments and exotic blocks (olistoliths and olistoplaques) set within a silty‐sandy matrix. Although strongly deformed following obduction, the ophiolite complexes constitute the key archive for reconstructing Phanerozoic interactions between the southern Eurasian margin and terranes derived from northern Gondwana across the Mesozoic Tethys. The excursion stops span this spectrum – from kilometer‐scale obducted peridotite massifs and their metamorphic soles, through gabbro–diabase complexes and granitoid intrusions, to small basaltic and radiolarian chert olistoliths in mélange, offering direct field evidence of the Tethyan lithosphere and its tectonic evolution.