Journal of the Virtual Explorer

The Maures Massif, the Corsica-Sardinia block and the Paleozoic basement of the Northern Apennines are different segments of the southern part of the Variscan Orogenic Belt (Elter et al., 2004; Vai & Martini, 2001 and references therein). Late Paleozoic megashears (Artaud & Matte, 1977; Rau & Tongiorgi, 1981; Ziegler, 1984; Neugebauer, 1989; Vai, 1991 and references therein) and the Tertiary separation and counterclockwise rotation of the Corsica-Sardinia Block from the European Plate and of the peninsular Italy from the former block (Montigny et al., 1981; Rehault et al., 1984; Vigliotti & Langenheim, 1995; Carmignani et al., 1995; Sartori, 2001 and references therein), and the Late Oligocene-Miocene Northern Apennines tectogenesis (which produced polyphase regional metamorphism and tectonic slicing in the Tuscan Paleozoic successions: Carmignani & Kligfield, 1990; Elter & Pandeli, 1990, 1993; Conti et al., 1991; Pandeli et al., 1994) complicate the correlations between the considered segments. This paper aims to summarize the structural-petrographic data about the Variscan successions of the Maures Massif, Corsica-Sardinia block and Northern Apennines and to define their relationships within the southern part of the Variscan Belt.