VIII.—The Petrography of the Franz Josef Fjord Region, North-East Greenland, in Relation to its Structure: A Study in Regional Metamorphism

Abstract

In the introduction to his previous paper on the Structure (Odell, 1939) the author included a short description of the stratigraphy of the region under review, and the briefest account only is therefore here deemed necessary.A principal feature of north-east Greenland is the considerable number of representatives of the Geological Succession which lie exposed in the ice-free mountainous tract between the Inland Ice Cap and the Greenland Sea. These formations include Pre-Cambrian, Palæozoic, and Mesozoic sedimentaries with Kainozoic eruptives. They have a general trend north and south, and while the older rocks are situated mainly inland, the younger ones lie along the fringes of the coast-line. Consequently, as one sails westward up the immense fjords which cut transversely across the formations, one moves downwards in the succession towards the older rocks. The older rocks, however, underlie by far the greater part of the ice-free area, and of these, sandstones and coarse elastics of Old Red type, quartzites, slates, and limestones ranging from Ordovician to Pre-Cambrian, and metamorphic rocks with granites comprising a Metamorphic Complex, are found in three great belts in order from east to west, between latitudes 72° and 74°. Within these limiting latitudes, the numerous inlets and deeply entrenched fjords, whose great bare walls display in remarkable fashion the multi-coloured formations and their structures, have yielded a considerable amount of information in recent years to the British, Scandinavian, and other geologists who have studied them.